Spring Hill Farms

I shot some video of our newest piglets. These are from our oldest sow. She only had 6 this time and 2 didn't make it. Her age may be starting to show as she normally has 10+

Anyway enjoy, piglets are always fun to watch!

Dr Mercola let's the cat out of the bag on organic eggs at the grocery..

Read it here

If you ordered chickens from us give us a call or email we may be able to fill your order now as some folks needed to reschedule. 

Contact Us

Read this great article by Dr Mercola

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2010/05/18/american-meat-is-even-more-disgusting-than-you-thought.aspx

For those who think chops, bacon, sausage, and ham when they think of pork....

I introduce you to Andrew of Slim Pickins

Andrew gets a pig from us every year and has it scalded instead of skinned which keeps all rind on the pig. Most folks aren't used to that anymore.This guys uses the whole pig.. feet, tail, head you name it, he has a dish. His latest post is the head.

Check it out here

How can you take something like a tomato and ruin it? The same way you can take a pig and raise it in a way that isn't sustainable or natural and end up with something that looks like pork but tastes like, you guessed it, cardboard! Most factory farm "premium pork" tastes like the brine and chemicals used to enhance the flavor.

According to ATTRA, sustainable agriculture follows the principles of nature to develop systems for raising crops and livestock that are, like nature, self-sustaining. I agree.

If you come to my farm I'm not going to give you my long passionate talk about the evils of big business agriculture and how we need to return to a more sustainable model. I'm going to give you a pork chop, unless you'd rather try our pasture raised chicken.

I've learned that once you taste and see that sustainably-raised food is superior to factory-farmed products, you will ask me where to get food that tastes so good. And I'll gladly tell you.

Find a sustainable farm practice in your area and see what they offer. You will be convinced that food produced according to nature tastes better because it is better . It's healthier, environmentally friendly, and it stimulates the local economy. As the old saying goes, "The proof of the pork is in the eating."

 If you're around our neck of the woods, we hope you'll try us at Spring Hill Farms

Until next time...

I came across some old writings recently that stated the Tamworth at one point had some "crosses of pigs having a strong infusion of Neapolitan blood...It is also said that a few breeders used a white pig that had been improved by Bakewell."

 I was surprised as everything I ever read about the Tamworth indicates no particular story of having any known infusion of other breeds.  Some have speculated that probably it did, have but no indication of what type.

 Although the writer didn't say anything with certainty, I found the account interesting.

They did start out saying "The Tamworth is probably the purest of the modern breeds of swine, it having been improved more largely by selection and care than by the introduction of the blood of other breeds."

They go on to say, "Fortunately the class of men who had undertaken the improvement of some of the other breeds, by sacrificing almost everything to an aptitude to fatten, did not undertake the Tamworth; hence the preservation of the length and prolificacy of the breed. For a number of years previous to 1870 the breed received comparatively little attention outside it's own home. About that time the bacon curers opened a campaign against the then fashionable short, fat and heavy shouldered pigs, which they found quite unsuitable for the production of streaked side meat for which the demand was constantly increasing. The Tamworth then came into prominence as an improver of some of the other breeds, in which capacity it was a decided success owing to its long established habit of converting it's food into lean meat."   

 We're thankful to those very early Tamworth breeders here at Spring Hill Farms, and once our customers try some of our old fashion hickory smoked bacon they are too!

Until Next time...

If you sent us any type of communication from our website from March 1st to March 16th, chances are we did not get it.

Our website had an "issue" where it wasn't sending us the email. It would tell you on your end that it did when in fact it didn't...

SO... If you signed up for our free pork or wanted on our mailing list you will need to go back to our site and re-submit your information.

 If you sent us a request for more information and you didn't hear from us, we didn't get it please re-send.

Oh the joys of the Internet...

Until next time...

Our Freedom Ranger chicks arrived at the farm today today. This video shows us putting them in the brooder.

These birds are from the Label Rouge program. We believe them to be better than the standard Cornish Cross chickens for the model we use to raise them. 

In my previous post  I outlined why I think they are superior to Cornish Cross for the pastured poultry farmer.

I will be showing you how these birds grow out this season so stay tuned for more videos.

Watch the video here.

 

Until next time...

A couple of days ago a close friend of mine called me to ask if I had watched Food Inc.

 Watch the trailer here.

I immediately knew what he was talking about as I had seen the reviews in Acres USA and a several other small farm, sustainable farming publications.

He had been exposed to it on the academy awards show, rented it on a whim, and was now calling me to see if I had seen it.

His reaction to the movie was pretty intense. I know him well enough to know he isn't easily impressed, so I thought I'd better get the thing and watch it.

My wife and sat down to watch it last night and by the time it was over I had experienced a host of emotions.

It made me mad enough to yell at the TV, I was enlightened, I cried at one point...this movie is an absolute MUST SEE if you want to see the truth about the food industry in America.

It was tastefully put together and doesn't have a visual shock value element where you can't watch certain scenes like some other things of this nature I have watched. 

Watch the trailer and get a copy you won't be sorry.

Until next time...

Cornish Cross birds are a lazy bird by nature with an insatiable appetite.

They basically sit, eat, and get bigger. These are admiral traits if the only goal is to produce a bird that grows very rapidly and produces a lot of breast meat.

However, if you sit back and observe this bird for very long you realize these cleverly select traits come with a price.

Research shows that these birds can gain weight at a rate faster than their skeletal system can bear.

This shows up as lameness and even broken legs. Another trait of these birds is they suffer heart failure.

You go to tend the birds, and find one stone dead for no apparent reason. More than likely it suffered heart failure.

Because they are so selectively bred for certain traits it can lead to a compromised immune system.

They are a fragile bird that was designed for huge agri-business to stuff in a confinement barn and feed sub therapeutic antibiotics to keep them healthy.

The hatchery told me to limit feed them so as to slow the growth rate down and help curb these health issues.

I did limit their intake of feed, and to a large degree it worked. But I came to the conclusion you were basically starving them to slow them down!

They are genetically designed to have an insatiable appetite. I raise Tamworth pigs on pasture and these birds make them look polite when it comes to feeding if they have ran out of feed for any length of time…even on grass.

Which brings up another observation: Freedom Ranger chickens are a far more aggressive forager of green material then Cornish Cross.

One of the health benefits touted by pastured poultry farmers is the opportunity for the birds to graze on green grass and bugs.

It made sense to me to use a bird that gets the most out the environment in which you raise it. Cornish birds were designed as an inside bird with no thought of foraging, that burns calories!

Contrast that with birds from the Label Rouge program in France (such as Freedom Rangers) and you see some distinct differences.

• They are a healthy robust bird
• Freedom Rangers grow slower without the problems associated with Cornish Cross.
• They are much more active foragers.
• Customers in taste test when compared to the Cornish Cross prefer Freedom Ranger.
  

I chose Freedom Rangers because after examining the facts I felt they were better suited to my model of farming and welfare standards.

Why take a bird that was bred for big business and put it in an environment that it was never designed for?

I realize pastured poultry farmers while minimizing the problems outlined here can raise Cornish Cross birds.

But for us at Spring Hill Farms, we think there is a better way.

Until next time…

Randy and I will building a temporary brooder today. The barn we had a brooder set up in burned down last Spring.

We have a batch of Freedom Ranger chicks coming in eight days so I though we better find somewhere to put them!

I didn't want to get birds this early but since we are having trouble keeping up with the demand I decided to get going as soon as possible.

The Freedom Ranger birds are part of the Label Rouge program from France.

We were looking for a bird that has a more aggressive nature to forage than the standard Cornish Cross birds that many folks use for pastured poultry.

The Freedom Ranger birds fit the bill! The meat is also excellent. They take a couple more weeks to grow out than Cornish Cross but as with any animal that matures slower, they are flavorful!

These birds remind you of old breed birds because they are! They are several different colors and are noticeably more active than Cornish Cross.

We are running them in poultry netting instead of movable pens or chicken tractors as some people call them.

You can see our philosophy on pastured poultry here.

I'll be sure to post more on these birds through the growing season. 

 Well I'm off to get started!

 Until next time...

I ordered our first batch of chicks Friday morning. We have pretty much quit using Cornish Cross birds and went with birds from the Label Rouge program.

We have always had good luck with the Cornish, but I've never been happy with the amount of foraging they do.

By genetic nature they are lazy birds. They don't scratch like a heritage breed bird does either. 

I have not ran them in poultry netting only movable pens because they don't seem like they would go very far in a open pen type arrangement.

All of the stock we select at our farm is based heavily on their nature to forage on grass.

That was why I went with Tamworth pigs. Then worked with them through selection to eliminate as much grain as possible and still get a nice finish.

Around here it's eat lots of grass or you're off to another farm or the processor.

Hopefully when these birds are ready to come out of the brooder we can get them on pasture, but who knows with two feet of snow on the ground now!

Guess we'll have to wait and see!

Until next time...

A new analysis which used the results of 21 previous studies,found no evidence between people's risk of heart disease and their intake of saturated fat. 

This is the fat found found mainly in animal fats and dairy. The press and medical experts have condemned it for years but this new information may shed some light on the subject.

 Many times the "western diet" is described as one high in red meat and saturated fat. But it's also high in processed foods and other highly refined carbohydrates.

Read the whole story here

Until next time...

If I figured right we'll have piglets by the middle of March. Randy and I have been working to get the new barn ready inside for the sows to be brought in.

I'm really hoping for nice size litters. Seems like every year I end up needing more pigs than I have. I hate turning customers away! 

 My average litter size is ten pigs per sow with one having at least twelve every time. It could drop off anytime though, since as pigs get older they tend to have smaller litters. 

She is an excellent mother though and even if she does "slow down" a bit I'll keep her. I tend to keep sows until they pretty much don't get pregnant anymore. A lot of your good genetics are in those old sows.

 My oldest sow is "Droopy." She was nickmamed this as a small feeder pig because her ears drooped forward which really is not a good trait for Tamworth pigs. She is the sow you see on the top of my web page, www.springhillfarms.us.

She may spend all her days here at the farm and be laid to rest down in the bottom under a tree somewhere.

We've never done anything like that, but Ol' Droopy is a special pig.

I'll be sure and post some pictures of these new litters.

Until next time....

I'm a collector of old agriculture books. I find so many of the old methods to be just what is needed for the sustainable farmer of today.

 The following passage has always made me smile.

*******************

 Our pigs, when old enough, are allowed to run out everyday, into the barn yard, in winter, and the pasture in summer; and we find this arrangement convenient for letting them in and out of the pens, as each pen opens directly into the barnyard.

If well bred and properly treated, the pigs will go to their pens as readily as cows or horses will go to their own stalls.

 This may be doubted by those who ill treat their pigs - or in other words, by those who treat their pigs in the common way. But it is nevertheless, a fact, that there is no more docile or tractable animal on the farm than a well-bred pig. There is a good deal of human nature about him. He can be lead where he cannot be driven. A cross grained man will soon spoil a lot of well-bred pigs. They know the tone of his voice, and it is amusing to see what tricks they will play on him.

We have seen such a man trying to get the pigs into their respective pens, and it would seem as though he had brought with him a legion of imps and seven of them had entered into each pig. No sow would would go with her own pigs, and no pigs would go with their own mother; the store pigs would go into the fattening pen, and the fattening pigs would go where the stores were wanted. Should he get mad, and use a stick, some active porker would lead him in many a chase around the barn-yard; and when one was tired, another pig, with brotherly affection, would take up the quarrel, and the old sows would stand by enjoying the fun.

Let no such man have charge of any domestic animal. He is a born hewer of wood, and the drawer of water, and should be sent to dig canals, or do night-work for the poudrette manufacturers.

 At their regular feeding time, we can take twenty or thirty of our own pigs, and separate them into their respective pens in a few minutes. They inherit a quiet disposition, and would dismiss on the spot, any hired man who should kick one of them, or strike them with a stick, and we cannot bear to hear an angry word spoken near the pens. - Harris on the pig, 1883.

 ******************

 So true! With our pigs being on grass, we move pigs constantly from one pasture to the next. Never have a problem. I've had some people tell me they think I could lead them to town and back!

 Notice the author says "at their regular feeding time". A huge key to pigs is they are very scheduled. Mine will be waiting at the gate about five to ten minutes before they are to be fed, moved, etc.

As one man said "pigs will do anything that is their idea!"

Until next time...

I was just talking to my wife about supper.She said I've got to get something planned for dinner. 

I replied as I always do..."something quick." I logged on to Andrews site and the post for today...

Something quick and pretty good for ya.

See his blog here.

BTW farmers here's something might be of interest to you.

 Selling your farm goods

The boys and I went to feed to the sows tonight in the 15" of snow that fell yesterday and last night.

We were in the barn and low and behold the sows heard us. The snow had my 36 inch gate about 15 inches high by the time they stood on the snow.

They jumped over the gate and came to meet us! 

They boys raced to the lot and they followed behind and jumped right back in!

Pigs... gotta love'm.

Until next time....