Pigs stack well with our grassfed beef

By Aaron and Melissa Miller

We’ve been raising pigs on pasture for the past 12 years. Our beef customers were asking about pork, and we decided it was a good candidate to round out our meat selection at the various markets we serve.

Pigs have become a profit center for us because we’re able to fill our delivery truck and sales trailer with a broader range of products when we go to market, making the days more profitable. Stacking pork atop our core grassfed beef business adds value without adding too much in the way of expense, including labor.

December 1, 2016July 12, 2022

A problem of distribution

Soil and yield testing showed shocking shortfalls in the back halves of paddocks

By Daniel Olson

So, I was sitting in my sister’s living room, admiring the newly purchased aerial photograph of their property. Their place is next to ours, so the main farm is also in the picture. You could clearly see the chicken tractors across the road, the junk pile we hide behind the barn, and the new building project.

But what really stood out were the different shades of green within our paddocks. As I looked closer, I could see that the darkest grass was always closest to the paddock gates, and it consistently lightened in direct proportion to the distance from those gates.

I shouldn’t have been surprised, and I guess I always knew that our highest productivity was toward the front of our paddocks. I decided to do some research this

November 1, 2016July 12, 2022

Getting paid to graze

Natural land care gaining popularity

By Janet McNally
One path to making a living with livestock is to be paid to graze other people’s properties. This month I’ll feature two graziers in very different parts of the country who employ goats in custom-grazing businesses.

Why goats? They are known for their ability to eat browse and weeds that cattle will not touch, and they are better browsers than sheep. Goats can be used to suppress noxious weeds and woody plants without competing directly with cattle for pasture.

September 30, 2016April 18, 2020

Does pasture diversity matter?

Recent trials show it boosts production and aids health

by Allen Williams, Ph.D.

The vast majority of established pastures in the U.S. are dominated by what I would term a “near monoculture”, meaning that most of the forage yield, or biomass production, is obtained through two to three primary forages in the mix.

Natural prairies are a different story, as we see literally scores of plant species in mixes consisting of grasses, legumes and forbs. I have been on “species counts” in native prairie where experts identified more than 150 different plants, sometimes more than 200. Continue reading “Does pasture diversity matter?”

September 30, 2016October 19, 2021

Passing a life’s work to a new generation

Apprentice program offers an opportunity

Colfax, Wisconsin — “I’ve enjoyed farming all my life.” With that statement, Chuck Flodquist may be speaking for quite a few veteran dairy graziers who would love to keep living the life.

But reality eventually comes calling. At retirement age, and three years past a back injury, Chuck recognizes he won’t be running his grass-based dairy forever. The 400-acre farm is a great place to grow grass and milk cows, and the steep slopes are better kept in forages than corn and soybeans. Continue reading “Passing a life’s work to a new generation”

April 1, 2016April 18, 2020

Drawing the line using peasant wisdom

By Jim Van Der Pol

Kerkhoven, Minnesota — We had been talking about the new dairy factories here in western Minnesota, my friend and I. We finished adding the 4,000 cows in the first one to the 10,000 in the next one, then the 10,000 cows in the just-completed one as well as the 10,000 in the just-proposed one. That is 34,000 cows, all within 12 miles of my house.

I told my friend that the dairy factories imported young men from South America to do the work and constructed bunkhouses at the site so they wouldn’t be bothersome in the town and create a public relations problem. Then, speaking from the experience of a lifetime in dairy farming, came his question: Continue reading “Drawing the line using peasant wisdom”