Hiding in Plain Sight

I know summer is in full swing when it sounds like a family of happy R2-D2 robots have moved in.

Birds. It's actually birds making all that robotic ruckus and the name of the bird is as joyful as the song they sing. The Peterson Field Guide describes their voice as "ecstatic and bubbling: starts with low, reedy notes and rollicks upward". I'm talking about bobolinks and they abound on the farm.

Each summer, the males hover about the hay fields, flashing their black and white tuxedos trimmed in yellow. The females look like large sparrows - all the better to hide since bobolinks nest on the ground.

They secret their nests down amongst the tall grasses and spend the long summer days eating insects, caterpillars and seeds of all sorts while raising up their young. They are GOOD at hiding those nests, too. Despite having spent most of my life working in fields with bobolinks, I had never seen a nest until this year.

A few weeks ago, while moving the sheep to a fresh paddock, a female bobolink flushed from nearly beneath my feet. I froze and scanned the ground carefully because it meant her nest was close and I didn't want to step on it.

It probably took a full minute but I finally spotted a little cup of woven grasses within the grass. Three speckled eggs tucked neatly inside. I took a quick picture, (hoping birds can forgive such invasions of privacy) and then used a thin, fiberglass fence post to mark the area so I could avoid it going forward.

Fields that are plowed, mowed low in spring, heavily stocked with grazing animals, or developed for yards and housing cannot support bobolinks and they sometimes struggle to find suitable habitat. Our farm seems to work well for their needs and I want to continue to do my part to protect them.

As I write this, the young bobolinks will have fledged from their nests. They are now flitting about the fields, learning from their parents. Come fall, they will migrate south to spend their winter in far-off places like Bolivia and Brazil. I will then have to wait many months to hear happy robots again.

You know, when I zoom in to look beyond the obvious life on this farm -- the sheep, cattle and humans, I always see hundreds of other lives and systems, ticking along at their own pace, each with their own and equal importance.

Sacred Cow

How we choose to feed ourselves affects everything else.

If you’re here, chances are you are in support of farmers like ourselves. But we also know there is plenty of information out there consistently telling eaters that meat (particularly beef) is wasteful, dirty, not good for the environment, unethical, unhealthy... the list goes on. Ooof, we feel the weight of that line of thinking every single day. Maybe you do too, especially if you're an eater of beef.

But is meat really that bad? Especially the beef we work so hard to raise well right here at home? No. It is not. In fact, well-raised beef can be a positive thing in so many ways. As boots-on-the-ground farmers we know this, but it takes more than a slogan or sound-bite to push back.

A few years ago we started following the work of a dietician and farmer in Massachusetts named Diana Rogers. We liked that her work was refreshingly considerate of context and nuance and we found her dietary suggestions reflected an actual working knowledge of responsible, community-based food production here in the northeastern US. She talks about nourishing bodies with real foods and agricultural systems rather than fads.

We've shared some of her information in previous emails and now she has released a book and a feature-length documentary, both called "Sacred Cow". In a world that wants to lump all meat together and the vilify it in favor of feeding humanity with mostly mono-culture grain crops and sugar, materials like these are sorely needed.

We watched the documentary when it was released briefly for pre-viewing. Kelly then set out to plow through the book in just a few days by listening to it on audiobook while doing chores. Both are REALLY well done. It will be again released to the general public in a few weeks.

We encourage you can go to the Sacred Cow website - www.sacredcow.info. From our farming perspective, in a world full of websites, books, and documentaries on food; this one is well done. After you read/watch/browse, we'd love to hear your thoughts. Does it raise any questions for you? Anything we can help answer as farmers?

Thank you for being on this journey with us. Wishing you so very well!

Buckling Up to Buckle Down

"The only way out is through... the only way out is through...."

That has been our mantra of choice for difficult farm seasons. We don't have any other words of wisdom or intense optimism to offer right now.  All we know is that as farmers, we know what it's like to deal with the unknown and we know what a blessing it is to find connection and comfort in community when things get tough. As such we wanted to let you know we're so grateful for the support shown to local farms in the past few weeks.

We can be here for you because you have been here for us.
Truly. Thank you.

Strangely, so much about farm life remains the same. The animals neither know nor care that the human world has been turned upside down. They move about their days with the same nonchalance that is always that of contented creatures. We think there is a lesson there if we look for it - to maybe channel our inner cow or chicken as best we can and just be in the moment. We are every day grateful to be in their presence because they remind us to focus on the essential things.

So that is what we've been doing. We care for the things within our control and hope like hell for the rest. We are growing a lot of produce again this year so there are seeds to plant. Soon there will be sheep to shear and calves to gentle. The hens give eggs daily and the grass is slowly growing green. One day, one task at a time - we keep moving forward.

Your recent support has allowed us to buy seed, feed, deer fence, and a load of extra hay. We just sent another load of beef to the processor and it should be ready within 10 days. We are doing everything we can to hang on through this, so we can be here afterward and feed you through it all.

We still aren't certain when farmers markets will resume but in the meantime we have developed a no-contact delivery and pick-up schedule that has been working well. We still have lots of good food available and lots more on the way. If you need anything the schedule is as follows:
 

SATURDAYS:
Pick-Up at New Hartford Shopping Center parking lot at 2pm sharp
** Please also shop with our partner farms for this pick-up. We have teamed up with Plumb Rocky Farm and Slate Creek Farm so you can also get their products at this pick-up. Please click on "Partner Vendors" under the New Hartford Pick Up Site Delivery Location information.
or
Home Delivery available to Clinton, New Hartford, Utica, Waterville Area 

SUNDAYS:
Pick-Up at Parry's Hardware Parking Lot in Hamilton at 2pm sharp
or Home Delivery available to Hamilton Area

MONDAYS:
Pick-Up at American Homesteader Parking Lot in Norwich at Noon

No contact ON-FARM PICK UP available any time:
Just contact us to place your order and we'll set up a time

You can place your order in the online store or send an email with any questions/requests.

Now is also a great time to sign up for a whole-farm CSA share as we can invest the funds directly back into the farm operation and therefore CSA gets first dibs on the food we produce. More info available below. :)

And lastly, please reach out to us if you or anyone you know is out of work or otherwise in need of good food but short on funds. We're happy to barter, accept volunteers (once the quarantine order is lifted), or otherwise meet people where they are, as much as we are able. Please talk to us if we can help.

**A word about our precautions: We've always been fussy about being clean but we're going extra right now: All orders are individually packed with freshly washed hands and we are the only people with access to our freezers. We do not leave the farm aside from no-contact deliveries. As of 4/2/20 we will be wearing clean, homemade masks to pack and deliver all orders. Please DO NOT return used egg cartons to us at this time. We can accept them again when things are less wonky... :)

We also want to share these words: As many of you know, Wendell Berry is another one of our heroes. His poems have often offered solace for our worried hearts. These particular lines seem so fitting for the times...

"Calling his neighbors together into the sanctity
Of their lives separate and together,
In the one life of the commonwealth and home,
In their own nation small enough for a story
Or song to travel across in an hour, he cries:
Come all ye conservatives and liberals
Who want to conserve the good things and be free,

Come away from the merchants of big answers,
Whose hands are metalled with power;
From the union of anywhere and everywhere;
By the purchase of everything from everybody at the lowest price
And the sale of anything to anybody at the highest price;
From the union of work and debt, work and despair;
From the wage-slavery of the helplessly well-employed.

From the union of self-gratification and self-annihilation,
Secede into the care for one another
And for the good gifts of Heaven and Earth."

~

(excerpt from The Mad Farmer, Flying the Flag of Rough Branch, Secedes from the Union
from The Mad Farmer Poems by Wendell Berry)

Be well, everyone! We'll get through this together and we're here if you need us.
Love,
Kelly, Adam, Silas and ALL the creatures of Quarry Brook

Maybe it's Easy, Eating "Clean"?

Since I raise food I am often asked for recipes. Lately the requests have been for 'clean eating" recipes. To be honest, I wasn't even sure what that meant.

In fact, the phrase brought to mind an image of a haughty, over-organized person who wants to tell people what to do. "Eat THIS, don't eat THAT." Recipe blogs involving lots of raw kale and sprouts came to mind...

But I finally looked into it and found...clean eating has no set definition! Some say it means eating only raw and organic fruits and veggies year round. Some say it's going dairy/gluten/sugar free. Others claim it's making EVERYTHING from scratch. Some say animal protein will kill you. Some websites will sell you packets of powdered meal replacements that are "super clean!" Oh man...

It seems open to interpretation. So here is my personal interpretation:

• Just eat real food, as minimally processed as possible.

• Do your best to eat things that can grow in or near your backyard.

• Enjoy it.

That's it. I feel like eating should be a pleasure, after all it's what makes everything else we do as humans possible. It's certainly no fun to make food decisions out of fear. Eating is essential to life, it shouldn't be stressful or rely on some factory formulation.

And that is a big part of why we farm - to offer real food from close to home and to raise it in a way that you can feel sound about. No factories or fear. :)

I hope you enjoy the rest of the week.  Wishing you well and thanks for being here!

Kelly

"Our life is being frittered away by detail...simplify, simplify."
-Henry David Thoreau

Of Fishers and Men

Most mornings I get the littlest farmer to school and then do a round of chores before heading back home for breakfast. I feel lucky to start each day surrounded by living creatures. Aside from the sounds of livestock I get to hear crows call from the elm tree, starlings chatter in the barn rafters, and sometimes a fox will give a quick bark from the hillside above the creek. I love that life abounds in all forms on this farm. 

Last Wednesday I got to glimpse a new creature. A fisher ran through the top of the field and across the road as I was feeding hay to the sheep. FIshers are solitary creatures and sightings aren't common. They are also slowly regaining population in this part of the state. To see one felt a little bit like luck. Once I was done with the hay, I followed and photographed it's tracks for a bit-just out of curiosity. 

Later that day I told a handful of people about my experience and their reactions fell into two separate categories. A few wanted to know more about it; what it looked like, how big it was, how it moved. The others warned me that fishers are fierce and that it would eat our chickens and/or lambs so I should probably get rid of it before it started gobbling up livestock. Sigh...I was beginning to worry and also regret my decision to share.

Then an octogenarian farmer friend gave me this humbling bit of advice. He said to me, "A well run farm will have plenty else for that fisher to eat besides your hens. It will be happy with the rabbits and mice in the woods. Your job is to keep the rest of the farm healthy so nature can keep moving. If it goes after your livestock then you'll have to act somehow, but in the meantime try to understand what it needs. It's easier to provide than to prohibit." 

Oh, how often we humans want to control the things we don't understand. Instead, what if we asked more questions?  It was his last sentence that rang like a bell-such a simple truth-to try to act from a place of understanding rather than fear; to allow something to meet its own needs by maintaining a holistic system. Seems like a good way to run a farm...and live a life.

Lots of love,
Kelly

Welcoming New Life

There is no moon and the dark is so deep walking into the field feels like being swallowed.  I walk uphill and listen to my feet sweep the wet grass while bullfrogs throb a syncopation from the pond.  

This field is vast and while I know where I want to go, the dark is disorienting. Having lost the power of sight to the night I listen for the muted, murmured sounds of the sheep to draw me in; a flock never really stops talking to itself. 

Thirty heartbeats later, I'm at the edge of their paddock. I breath out and speak to the ewes in a low voice before scissor-hopping over their electric fence, happy to have cleared it completely.  It doesn't always happen that way and the result is, well, shocking. 

Now I need light and I switch on my headlamp. The night is suddenly alive with hundreds of eyes, a sea of startled fireflies. Among them I'm looking for one ewe. She started her labor earlier and should be lambing now if all is well. 

After a moment I spy a single pair of eyes, alone and adrift near the fence line. She turns her head away and the green-fire reflections blink out. I creep carefully close and I can see she is attending to something on the ground. She makes a low, chuckle-gurgle in the back of her throat, a sound ewes make only when they are talking to new lambs.  

I wait and again count my heartbeats to pass the time, twenty, thirty...fifty.  Then I hear the sound that cracks my shepherd heart every time, a bleating, pleading, ascending note that seems to be the birth song of all mammals. All is well and I retreat, happy to leave the ewe to the privacy of darkness and her time-old task.

Cultivating resistance in a world that wants everything cheaper, bigger, and more efficient: Our thoughts on the current farm crisis.

Did you know that you're revolutionary?  That might sound drastic but it's true. By purchasing at least some of your food directly from a farmer you are rebelling against a food system that wants everyone to consolidate and conform.  As farmers, we are so grateful for you and your rebellious tendencies. Here's why:

Everywhere one looks there is another farm closing up or going under.  Dairy farms are in a tailspin and therefore in the news. Just this morning we learned a farmer friend is shuttering his farm. The 'Auction Notice' page in a local farm publication has become pages. Things are getting desperate for many and customers are asking us what they can do to help local farms.

Our worst fear is that it may be too late for many farms. Here we are, nearing the bottom on a 40-year slide into consolidation and incorporation that, left unchecked, will continue to squeeze small farms into oblivion. Part of the current problem for dairy farmers is that they have little control over the pricing, processing, or distribution of their product.  No control means no power and no choice.  For the sake of ease and efficiency, our country is asking the farmers who produce our food to be slaves to a corporate food system. 

The culmination of the "get big or get out" era of agriculture could very well be an entire food supply in the hands of corporations. They will make the choices about what we eat because there will be no alternative.  The days of diversified, independent farms that actually grow food will be gone and school kids will think we're crazy when we try to teach them a song about an old farmer who had cows, pigs, and chickens. E-I-E-I-O. It sounds dramatic but it's happening right now. Farms are going out of business at lightning speed.

As long as people need food, farms have a chance but the farmers have to have some influence and control on their markets.  Over two decades ago, forward-looking farmers saw this current problem coming and started returning to a way of farming that eliminated intermediary distributors, processors, and marketers.  Instead they sought to connect directly with their customers. Farmers markets sprang up, CSA became a familiar term, and organic/naturally-grown certifications arrived to help consumers differentiate at-a-glance between conscientious farms and their massive industrial counter-parts.  Independent farms who connected directly with their customers were making a go of it, so much so that corporations sat up and took notice. 

Today, big corporations have jumped on and largely bought-up what those small farmers were selling; just think about how food choices have changed in supermarkets over the past twenty years.  Everywhere you look, a large company is cashing-in and probably using pretty pictures and words like local, natural, farm-fresh, organic, artisanal, sustainable, small-batch on the labels to do it. 

There are many examples of industry making it big on the backs of small farms. If corporate-owned supermarkets can get customers to purchase grass fed beef, artisanal bread, or organic kale in their stores, those customers no longer go directly to the farmers. The big stores lure customers in with the promise of small-scale local products but consistently drop those farmers' products after a short time. For the sake of ease, efficiency, and a few dollars saved, our country is letting those who produce our food be replaced by a corporate food system.

Farmers can grow more than enough food to feed the world but they need consumers to buy it from them, not at a superstore after a long line of processors, distributors, and wholesalers have taken a bite. We need to remember food comes from farms and to shop at a farmers markets, farms, co-ops, and buying clubs whenever possible. This will keep non-corporate farms in business long enough to work on the distribution issues that are the real root of hunger.  This is how we restore rural economies and communities and why the local food movement can’t just be a waning trend that corporations adulterated and then rode to a sad end. When farms lose control of what they produce, we lose farms.
 

This is why you’re a revolutionary. Every time you purchase directly from a farmer, you are helping them stay in control of their market and their farm.  You are telling corporations you don’t need their gimmicks to feed your family.  You are part of the movement that puts farmers who truly care about land, animals, and soils-our collective future-back in charge of food.