Happy Cows

The homes of most beef cattle would never publish photos. Feedlots aren’t very photogenic.

But Pinederosa Produce had too many good pics to pick from.

These chilled out Angus cattle rested in the sun on a bed of grasses with crimson, burnt orange and lime colored leaves as a backdrop on a recent fall day.

They’re healthy and chemical free. As you can see, they eat a salad bar of timothy, clover and alfalfa not force-fed grains their rumens can’t digest properly.

Someone recently asked me how much we make farming. I told him a few small, non-impressive numbers, biting at the most traditional way to measure success of a business. While we aren’t lining our pockets, we are rich in intangible earnings. We get to work outside and with our hands. We feed a few people healthy, local food. We get to have our hands licked by cattle. And so forth.

Because we want to know where our food comes from — yes — we will eat these steers.

If you want sustainable food raised locally in a human way, get in touch. We are accepting orders for beef, pork, lamb, chicken, goat, duck and geese throughout October.

Meat Options

Pinederosa Produce in Pine City has expanded its offering of grass-fed, outdoor-raised meats without antibiotics or hormones. It’s local and direct from our farm family to yours.

The Pinederosa offers a 5 percent early-order savings if submitted before Sept. 15.

We also offer 10 to 15 percent savings if you order in bulk. Split with family or friends for added savings.

Please contact us to discuss pricing, processing and availability as it is subject to change.

Our 2011 offering:

– Grass-fed beef, available Nov.-Dec., in ground beef, quarters, halves and whole.

– Pastured chickens, available now-fall, in whole birds or cut up.

– Grass-fed lamb, available Sept.-Oct., in halves and whole.

– Open-air pork, available Sept.-Oct., in halves and whole.

– Healthy goat, available Sept.-Oct., in halves and whole.

– Turkey, available Nov., in limited quantity.

– Ducks and Geese, available Oct.-Nov., in limited quantity.

Recent photos of the farm

New logo

Pinederosa Produce is proud to present our new logo.

Our friend, a graphic designer and supporter of sustainable agriculture, designed it for us. We gave her our natural-raised chicken; she gave us a great logo. A good old-fashioned exchange sans dollars. Feels good to help each other out.

Fresh batch(es) of chickens

One man went to Brainerd yesterday. He and 180 chickens came back to the farm in Pine City. He returned with 76 processed chickens and 104 day-old chicks.

The circle of life packed into one red Ford F-150.

The processed chickens are USDA E2 certified, meaning Pinederosa Produce complies with Minnesota state law to sell to restaurants, grocery stores, farmers’ markets as well as to family, friends and other customers who buy directly from the farm.

As I returned to Pine City near dusk, I got the cute day-old chicks into their new home and the wrapped chickens into the freezer. But I wasn’t done there. I had to go put the 40 five-week-old chickens from the pasture into the portable coop and closing the doors on the main coop for the geese, ducks and turkeys.

As I was getting ready to do this, a hay farmer on the country music radio station I was listening to said, “If a farmer says he’s done, he needs to look behind him because he left something undone.”

Now read that line again, but this time in a thick country drawl.

Good.

From shit to strawberries

Peers: Pinederosa Produce possesses pastured poultry.

With the help of our first WWOOF volunteer, Nicole, we converted an old trailer into a portable shelter for chickens last week. There’s chicken wire along the sides, hog panels bent over the top and a tarp over that. They are enclosed in there at night, and have a small run of the pasture each day.

The goal is to have chickens that live as naturally as possible while trying to protect them from foxes, wolves, hawks and other predators.

The peeps can rest inside on hay or lay outside in the grass. Above, they are all outside because they saw me coming. They know when I come, I bring food.

The benefit of having them outside is that they will supplement some of their feed by eating worms, parasites and larvae of flies. They will trample down the grass and fertilize the soil with their potent shit.

“The area where the chickens just were will looked trashed for a week or so, then turn green and lush, so that you can see the track of  the chicken pens through the field by its deep green color,” writes Ann Larkin Hansen in The Organic Farming Manual.

The book recommends moving them every day or every other day, but I left them in this spot for about five days. We’ll see how fast it recovers.

I must move the chicken house more frequently because chicken shit is one of the most potent natural farm ingredients. At five parts carbon to one part nitrogen, it has more nitrogen than cattle or pig shit.

On a sweeter note

Here’s our first batch of strawberries from June 21. The season started late since it was cool and wet, but state experts estimate that while the season might be a little shorter this year, the conditions will make for a good crop.

My brother visited the farm this weekend and said, “That’s the best strawberry I’ve ever had.”

From oink to quack

The Pinederosa has been busy making and raising produce — and not producing anything for the blog in the last month. Sorry, but spring has been hectic.

We are still working on getting all the vegetables into the garden, while making sure our 200-plus animals are fed, watered and pastured.

To go with the cows, sheep, goats, chickens and dogs, we’ve also added pigs, ducks, geese and turkeys.

I will briefly opine on the swine, but I have some potatoes to plant and a chicken tractor to build, so it will be mostly pictures.

The 16 pigs are from a farm in Montrose. They were raised inside, so naturally, we set them up with a fresh-air pen — and plenty of cow manure to wallow in.

As the little piggies stuck their snouts in the muck, Rod said, “Oh, this is hog heaven.” Before I went to the next chore, I thought about my piece of Pinederosa heaven, and how I wish to spend some time in it before fall comes!

The next task was reinforcing fence, so the goats and sheep could munch on grass, clover, weeds.

And now, the cutest additions are the ducks and geese we picked up this week.

39 is the charm

The Pinederosa added 39 critters in the last two weeks. We bought 22 sheep from a farm in Bruno, 1o goats from a farm near Little Falls and seven goats from a farm near New London.

These little guys (and a few gals) are less than 50 pounds and will go out in the pasture once it greens up, and once we add some fence to keep them in.

The goats are a Boer cross breed, the seven from New London are pure Boer and were thought of as eligible for 4H projects and fairs. The sheep are a mix of Dorset, Suffolk and Claudette breeds.

Adding this many goats and sheep is a big step up for Pinederosa Produce. We had only five of each last year.

On a side note: Last night, we enjoyed a leg of lamb from one of last year’s animals. We put it in the slow cooker, and tada, succulent flavors.

Right now though, they are pretty cute and friendly.

A first-timer

Since 15 of the goats are bucklings (boys) and two are doelings (girls) and the previous farmers didn’t do it, we were left with the job of, ahem, castrating the little guys.

We had a little tool to spread rubber bands and slide over their man-parts. I held most of them, while Rod put the band on them.

It’s apparently relatively painless. The band cuts circulation, and after a few weeks, their berries fall off.

Most of the little guys didn’t protest. A few did, but it only took a few seconds.

I was holding one of the bigger ones, when Rod said, “Oh, these are a nice–”

I cut him off with laughter. “Nice” probably shouldn’t be an adjective used when you are cupping goat nuts!

After they were “banded,” some of the guys went in for a closer look.

It’s the image that counts

When I tell my friend in L.A. about my farming experiences, he thinks about me waking up to a rooster at the crack of dawn.

That’s not really how it goes down, but if it did, here’s the vocalist.

Moooooooovin in

Pinederosa Produce added 12 Angus steers to the farm about 10 days ago. These boys weigh about 650 pounds and were born on a small grass-fed farm in the northeastern Minnesota town of Meadowlands.

They are currently hanging out in a corral, munching on a clover, grass and legume hay until the pastures dry out and green up.

When one of our loyal customers found out about the Pinederosa getting this year’s herd, he joked about wanting to name the one of them. This guy bought a full — or about 400 pounds of steaks, roasts and ground beef — from us last fall and plans to do so again this fall. I laughed off his facetious request, but he persisted, and I thought about it more.

I thought this could be a good thing, just like community-supported agriculture, where people buy shares in a farm. We could sell “naming rights.”

Our loyal customer and good friend might name one “Thomas” or he might name one “Tenderloin.”

The point is he knows where his food comes from. He knows his farmers personally. He is vested in what we do, and wants to have a deeper connection here.

If you want to put an order in for a quarter, a half or a whole, you can name one, too.  Why not?

We welcome that type of relationship and understanding in that while we raise the steers with care … we also eat them. The point is to know where your food comes from and how it is made.

The arrival of the steers was pretty quiet compared to what happened last year.

We don’t have permanent corrals for them, so we put up temporary panels and secure them in with T-posts. We then move the hay racks, waterers, pallets and other objects behind the panels so the steers don’t get any ideas about busting loose. Until we get permanent corrals put in this summer, it looks pretty redneck-ish.

We were moving a small trailer to one side of the corral, when Rod said, “We don’t want this over there. We’ll look like the Clampetts” [from the Beverly Hillbillies].

“Now, you say that?” I reply.

It turns out, there is a reason for the fortification attempt.

Last year, Rod came home from work, changed clothes and went out to check on the cattle. They weren’t in the corral. Not one of the 22.

He scanned the yet-to-be fenced pastured and saw a few off in the distance. He telephoned the farmhand, Andrew from Hinckley, for help.

They tracked them along the creek bed and were able to get ahead of them and lead them back into a temporary pasture.

“I was panicking the whole time, wondering if I could get them in and if they would stay in,” Rod said.

In hindsight, Rod was able to joke about it.

“So, either I left it [the gate] open, or there is a smart cow in there.”

15 Hens come on in

We have had five black Australorp laying hens since the beginning of March. This week, we added 15 more hens and two roosters.

Seven hens and one rooster are Wyandotte, and the others are a mix between Rhode Island Red and New  Hampshire Red. The last hen, and this guy’s a real looker, is a Black Leghorn. (I’ll post a picture when he wants to be more photogenic!)

With the whole bunch, the Pinederosa gets about a dozen eggs a day. The woman that sold them to us said the eggs were so big, she couldn’t close the cartons. She wasn’t lying; the eggs are enormous.

Green means go

The garden seedlings underneath the lamp in the basement are really taking off. They needed to be transplanted into bigger containers. Now, if we can just get rid of the frost and the overnight dustings of snow.

The garlic was the first plant to show life in the garden this spring. They were poking green shoots through the thawing soil about two weeks ago.

The second green think came last week with expanding buds on the fruit trees and shrubs. The Honeycrisp and the Honeygold apple trees were the most vibrant.

My Peeps: Once the egg cracks, a hearty (and hurting) bunch

Still blurry-eyed from Monday night’s Bright Eyes concert, I was awake before Tuesday’s sunrise — as any self-respecting farmer would be.

OK, fine, that whole “self-respecting farmer” description is a bit of a stretch. I haven’t routinely been on my two feet before the sun shines since the Pinederosa last had chickens needing feed last November. It was the pending arrival of the same creatures that got me out of bed Tuesday.

During my weekend getaway in the Twin Cities, two sheds were delivered to the Pine City farm. The smaller 8-foot by 10-foot shed would rest on the edge of the garden and serve as a part-time brooder for the 50 birds coming Tuesday afternoon.

When I showed up, the shed didn’t have doors, so the peeps will have to call the garden shed home just like they did last fall.

No big deal because there’s just something about playing a “self-respecting farmer.” There’s joy in getting out of the city, having my hands tug on the twine of straw bales, stringing out orange extension cords, washing off water jugs and carrying pales of sawdust. It’s moving and making something with your hands. It’s disconnecting from technology. It’s being alone (as a human) with the chorus of returning geese audible and roaming dogs visible. At peace.

That bliss was disrupted when the 50 chicks didn’t show that afternoon. The woman at the hatchery said they were put in the mail Monday and should have arrived Tuesday. The postmaster private said with Minnesota divided into zones, packages send from Brainerd go to Eagan and then Pine City. The packages are expected  to be delivered in two days, meaning the package should arrive Wednesday morning.

Well, as the sun shined into the kitchen window Wednesday morning, the post office called.

“Your chicks are here,” the postmaster private said cheerily with the cacophony of chirps in the background.

I went to the post office’s blue door right away – albeit about 16 hours after the hatchery and I expected them to arrive.

The postmaster private behind the door said, “They are noisy — that’s good.”

The furry tennis balls were as adorable as ever. But once their little legs hit the sawdust floor, a number of them began to hit the dust.

All said, about 15 died within 12 hours. Sad.

The woman at the hatchery, who sends chicks in the mail all the time, said it never happens that it takes two days to deliver that distance. She said she doesn’t insure the birds because there isn’t a risk and she puts green pellets on the bottom of the ventilated box to keep the chicks hydrated during delivery. Since they were in there so long, most of the pellets were gone.

The post office said they did everything they typically do.

(This was a discrepancy I don’t understand. Both the hatchery and post office should know what they are talking about, but they both gave different answers. Huh.)

It wasn’t the fact that they were delivered in the mail. If local food advocate and author Barbara Kingsolver receives birds by delivery, it must be traditional and safe. The postmaster private said they get birds delivered from the west coast without a problem.

It must have been a fluke, but the typically great day — the start of the season — began with a few less chirps.

They are still pretty cute.

Maple syrup cookin’

The Pinederosa has been boilin’ down the maple sap we’ve collected into syrup.

We picked up this wood-burning stove especially for the task.

Grab a book, listen to the sing-song of birds and the honking of geese, stoke the fire and stir the syrup. It takes a few hours, but it’s a good relaxing afternoon.

Garlic sprouts up

As I pealed back the straw, the garlic showed it’s alive and well.

Thursday night sunset on the Pinederosa

Signs of spring, believe it

The nearly nine inches of snow yesterday wouldn’t give you a hint, but the Pinederosa has been experiencing many signs of spring.

It started about two weeks ago with a phone call to Brau’s Hatchery in Brainerd for 50 chickens. The peeps, our first batch of the season, will arrive April 5 — and the snow better be gone by then. (Got that, Mother Nature?)

A couple of days after that, we planted seeds in our basement storage closet/greenhouse/utility room.

Within a week, we had sprouting tomatoes.

About 10 days later …

Over the next week, the cauliflower, brocolli,  cantilope, cabbage went green as well.

OK, fine. We were creating spring, instead of witnessing it naturally, but we had real signs as well last week with tapping the maple trees for syrup.

The Pinederosa got about eight or so gallons of raw sap in the first week. Then the snow and freezing temperatures shut off the taps.

The sap will run again, and our 10 or so taps will be there to collect it. Then we will cook it, bottle it and give it away and sell it. Yum.

The final sign of real (not recreated) spring was the return of geese to the creek. On Thursday, I saw two. Friday brought seven. Saturday another half dozen overhead. Then the snow, and, um, not one seen since.

They will come back to the Pinederosa. They will.

Pinederosa joins Minnesota Grown

Pinederosa Produce has become a part of Minnesota Grown, the preemptive directory of small food producers and distributors in the state.

We joined the more than 840 family farms, farmers’ markets and garden centers in this year’s directory. Minnesota Grown, part of the Minnesota Department of Agriculture, published more than 190,000 directories last year.

Here’s what our 550-character directory listing will say:

“Baaing sheep, squawking chickens, mooing cows and barking dogs roam rolling green pastures near thick woods and a slow creek. Emerald kohlrabi, crimson tomatoes, round onions, beige eggs, scarlet raspberries, giant pumpkins, navy blueberries, hidden potatoes, scarlet apples, towering sunflowers and blonde sweet corn share the garden. The Pinederosa has good food outside the traditional-industrial paradigm. No walls. No quotas. No drugs. No bottom-line paranoia.  Just good food raised in a natural way. We’ll be your farmer, but the dogs stay with us.”

Also on the application is a list of what your farm produces. Here’s ours according to this year’s tentative plan.

The garden: Apples, Asparagus, Beans, Blackberries, Blueberries, Broccoli, Cabbage, Carrots, Cucumbers, Garlic, Grapes, Lettuce, Herbs, Kohlrabi, Melons, Onions, Pears, Peppers, Plums, Potatoes, Pumpkins, Raspberries, Rhubarb, Squash, Strawberries, Sweet Corn, Sweet Peas, Tomatoes.

The livestock and other things: Beef, Chicken, Turkeys, Goats, Lamb, Maple Syrup and Eggs.

Then there’s Pine City’s Farmers’ Market in the Park directory listing:

“Stroll through beautiful Robinson Park in Pine City while shopping for the area’s freshest local produce, baked goods and hand crafts. Our goods are produced from within 50 miles of the market. Up to 30 vendors set up each Friday and Saturday rain or shine to continue the 100-year tradition of providing local food and crafts to the community.”

Now that it’s “meteorological” spring, let’s melt snow. C’mon.