Felton Acres, Fishing, Family

The Original Santa Rosa Farmer's Market

2012-02-26T02:53:00.003-08:00

The Original Santa Rosa Farmer's market needs your help. This is a farmer owned non-profit organization that has been operating a farmer's market at the same location for 41 years. 41 years. In flush times, the Santa Rosa Parks and Rec department was giving them a pretty sweetheart deal on rent, and the group of course rolled that into a market with one of the lowest booth fees around.

I am not there, I have been moving my product direct to consumer until now, mainly because I was so small I could and because I hated my one experience with the Certified Producer's Certificate with the Sonoma County Ag commissioner. No offense to those good people, I understand why they have to do it (to prevent people from just buying product from the central valley and selling it at a farmer's market as their own) but I truly dislike paperwork. Administrivia. gack. Anyway I point this out to show that I have no vested interest in this market yet. But I see an injustice being done here.

What I understand from Heather Irwin's article in the Press Democrat, the Parks and Rec department decided that the gig was up, times are no longer flush and its time for the local sustainable small farmers to cough up their rent in full starting July 1. They were not really informed in writing, they heard about it through rumors apparently and asked for a meeting. During this meeting they expressed shock and dismay, and as a farmer run co-op they had to go back to their membership and develop a process of deciding how to handle it. They developed a committee creatively named the "rent" committee and investigated other sites, informally polled the vendor-members, and were just basically wrapping that up and getting ready to vote to stay when suddenly they were informed the lease had been granted to a new group.

This group is formed by Dan Smith the owner of the French Garden restaurant. A pillar of our community and someone everyone in Sebastopol owes a great debt to for being involved in the turnaround of our local hospital which we absolutely adore and really should not be without. Medical attention is so important. I know for me I feel a lot better knowing that if an employee of mine is injured there's a hospital less than 10 minutes away. And that's just the farming angle. Nate has been to that ER 3 times already. If Dan Smith wants me to jump my answer will be "how high?" He appears to have a long standing feud with the manager of the market, an employee of the farmer-members who run the market. Well its time for that to stop. The changes he wants to make: (as I understand it, I have yet to meet with him in person which I hope to correct very soon) to grow the market, make the process of selection of new vendors more transparent, and give extra weight in the vendor selection process to farms that are more local, are goals that could be easily accepted by vendor/members of this non-profit that runs the market. The manager is simply their employee, to be hired/fired and managed by their elected board of directors; her personality or whatever has nothing to do with it. She is a hard worker by all accounts and her being as feisty as, well, I am, is no horrible mark against her in my book.

So is this the right way to handle the situation? Here you have a pure representative democracy, a non-profit run by an elected board of directors, with a manager hired by a recent vote of 52-12 of the general membership. Is it a clean process without acrimony? certainly not, you need a benevolent dictator for that. But its so American, and being in this meeting, where even total wing nuts with no affiliation with the market whatsoever (like me) got their 60 or 120 seconds to say whatever they wanted was inspirational, and I was just so inspired to be in a room full of farmers who were trying to cope with a threat to their method of obtaining income and by and large comporting themselves with fantastic aplomb. They've been a tenant here, built a history, and been successful for 41 years. Did the parks and rec department negotiate with them in good faith? It would appear not. I really have to wonder if the right solution here isn't for this new Redwood Empire group to just be allowed into the current market so they too can become voting members who can have their say in meetings and convince the other farmers to start doing things in a way that will benefit everybody including the market. This might force them to remove from their midst anyone who has pending litigation against the market and/or its individual members, but that's probably for the best. Can we all agree that there's too many frivolous lawsuits in this country?

Back to the action taken by the Park's and Rec department to just award the contract to a new entity with no board of directors, no bylaws, funded by one set of deep pockets, without warning to its current tenant. Let me make an analogy here. Lets say you own a house, and you are renting it to an old lady who's been there for 41 years. You were doing good, business was great, and you were giving this lady a break on the rent because you thought she was cool and you could. Well, the economy went south, you suddenly were scraping by, and you decide that you need that old lady's rent to go up. Not to mention, she's been a pain to deal with sometimes, she's got a bit of a surly personality and she never seems to answer your phone calls or respond to your requests. A slick young businessman arrives in a BMW and offers you the full value of rent for that apartment, pays first and last month's cash deposit right there on the spot. Do you accept this offer and chuck your current tenant out on the street? I say no way, you are obligated to go back to that old lady, tell her she has x number of days to respond to your request to meet the new price of rent, or leave your house. And frankly, when it comes to old ladies, many places (like SF) you definitely can't even do that.

So anyone reading this blog post, if you live in Sonoma County, please contact your supervisor and request that they require their parks and rec department employee to get back to the negotiating table with the current tenant of 41 years. In my opinion, the rent increase should be phased in over 5 years or something fair and not sudden just because revenues for the county or city are down. That's not the fault of the farmers in this county. Farming is good for the county! They harness the free power of the sun and soil microbes, and convert it into an export product, thus importing money into our economy and raising the standard of living in our county, to the extent that some of the product is sold to people from outside the county. It goes the other way, farmers from Mendo can produce there and sell to us here and take some of our money up there. But nothing stops us from selling at their farmer's markets. That's the free market. In any case, its my opinion that farmer's markets _should_ get a sweetheart rent deal. I have yet to meet a farmer selling at a farmer's market getting rich off of what they are doing. Those that are wealthy would do well to make darn sure they are acting as a force for the good of those good people...

to blog or not to blog?

2011-12-18T16:24:00.000-08:00

When Google+ came out, I figured oh cool, now I can drop twitter, facebook, and the blog and just use Google+ for everything. But if Google+ is being used by more than a handful of people around where I live then its news to me. It just isn't taking over the other services as I'd hoped, even though it would be much better for all of us if the other less functional sites would just go away. (facebook and twitter, how about just throwing it in?) They seem to have reached critical mass, where like Ebay, the other sites are just never gonna get there because the biggest one is the only place most people care to be. Crappy or no, they seem to have traction and critical mass and I am stuck dealing with the mishmash SM stuff to spend my dark-outside time on.

I return to the blog for a simple reason: I have something on my mind. Its food of course: is the food we sustainably produce too expensive? Is it worth the blood, sweat, and tears to create this food if my friends can't afford to feed it to their kids? Isn't that why I started farming, to make better tasting, more nutritious, better for the planet and our community food for my friends to feed to their kids?

But what is "can't afford?" I know people who drive Lexus' and BMW's who don't buy local food because they think it is over priced. People who have read Omnivore's Dilemma, and have plenty of money, just can't see spending twice the price of Rosie when she's organic fed after all. I also have among my customers people who are clearly making every penny count but wouldn't buy a Rosie if their dinner depended upon it. Yet for everyone, food IS a large part of the monthly budget (even if its a smaller part in the USA than it is in every other developed country) and is everyone ready to double that? Then do it again? What if they are already having a hard time saving up a nest egg and nourishing the 401-K? Dont those 2 need to be prioritized over eggs with less cholesterol and more vitamin D? I mean, you don't DIE from eating a $1.50 dozen of eggs, but you could easily croak if you dont have health insurance and you get sick, at least if the tea-party gets to take over you are dead.

How can we prioritize something as indirect as our topsoil and our ocean and our atmosphere when these things are so vast that any major damage we do to them will only really manifest itself in our children or grandchildren's lifetimes? Paying for college and gas for the commute and the rent is so RIGHT NOW. Plus, these are the commons, and without everyone having a crystal ball isn't it a little silly to make financial sacrifices yourself when everyone else is just gonna go for what's cheapest? And as for the welfare of animals, well, what's more important, animals or people? Vegans you are not spared, your vegetable mono-crops come at the expense of wildlife from huge to microscopic, both on the farm and very very far away. It is shipping our topsoil off to the ocean. It is messing up the climate, terrestrial hydrology, and polluting non-stop.

A Kurt Vonnegut quote comes to mind. I can't remember what it was exactly but it was something along the lines of "I smoke because I'm too cowardly to commit suicide all at once." We can't see the future, these changes are happening slowly and the effects are absorbed by the vastness of the systems involved (the solution to pollution is dilution). A few people have put some money into getting some data that shows us that sustainably produced food is actually better for our bodies. Focus groups have shown that people won't really pay more for the environment but they will pay more if they think its better for their health. But there isn't much out there proving that conventionally farmed food is actually bad for our bodies. There is a lot of unexplained illness and disease we didn't used to have (heart failure, cancer) but this could be environmental too, or social issues like more stressful lives. So we are back to why pay $8 for something you can get for $1.50?

Why can you get it for $1.50 anyway? How did that happen? Developing systems that reduced risk, minimized labor, and maximized efficiency. What are the costs and who pays? Animal suffering=not me, environmental degradation=not me, human exploitation(cheap labor)=not me. Also governmental corruption subsidizing any farming that is cheaper than the others makes this uber-cheap food possible. Modern marketing further allows for pushing food that isn't really food at all and for changing traditional nourishment strategies into modern ones. How in the hell have we convinced people of the complete oxymoron that food should be cheap and illegal immigration is just a bunch of criminals ruining our country? Media/marketing of course.

People will say that markets determine all of this. Cheap food exists because there is a market for it, and sustainable will take over only if and when the market demands it. Alas markets are not truly free of outside forces and thus dont work in reality as well as they should in theory. We behave irrationally for a variety of reasons. But most importantly I think that the corrupting power of money has so much control over policy that we have the markets we do in a large part because super wealthy people think its better for them this way. I disagree, I think the current economic system as deployed since Reagan of dismantling the New Deal is weakening the middle class, the true big spenders of our economy, which actually hurts the wealthy, who's wealth is invested in markets which crash when the middle class has no more money to spend. Robert Reich just nails this one: first we sent women to work, then we worked longer hours, then we borrowed like no tomorrow, and now there's just nothing left for the middle class to do for themselves to increase their spending power. Their bosses just have to increase their pay at this point for their wealth to grow. And that ain't happening you communist america hater. As long as we can be convinced that the reason our local governments are so broke is because of teacher, police, and fire-fighter pensions then we aren't going to make any progress strengthening the middle class. And of course, its gotta go way beyond the public sector, the middle class needs more wealth across the board. The wealth is right there in Warren Buffet's bank account. He's one of the good guys, but the point is, the super rich are richer and more numerous and powerful because the middle class is dwindling, and educational quality has been dropping for a while now, and we are all plugged into a media that can convince anyone that which is bad for them is actually good and vice-versa. I'm not convinced there is really such a thing as wealth creation. I think its a vast closed system, like the atmosphere, and it all sorta sloshes around. You add to this pile by removing some from that one.

So maybe the question isn't why should we pay more for food when we have so little money to go around and should instead be why is there so little money to go around? Its basically the force behind the Occupy protests, why do I have enough free time to Occupy this place instead of working? Because I have no job. Because the old contract with our society, that if I'm willing to work hard for a lifetime I get to have kids and a place to live and a good education for them and a comfortable old age has been chucked out the window.

We live in THIS place, at THIS time, with THIS system. A local farmer once admonished a bunch of us: "we farm in the economy we have, not the one we want" and surely the same is true for the consumer. So what can we do?
-pray, work, and advocate for change towards a more just society
-vote
-buy direct from a local farm so they can farm sustainably and you can afford it since there isn't a middle man with his margin
-plant a garden
-get skilled in your kitchen
-heck if I know

I wish I really knew the answer and could figure out how to produce wholesome food for less right here in Sonoma county, without cheating the land, our employees, or our livestock. They after all give their last measure of devotion to become immortalized as part of our children.

lets try this again

2011-05-11T20:59:00.000-07:00

OK, its been a few months again. the longer it gets the more daunting the post ultimately becomes, thus forming a vicious cycle. To break this, I'm going to resort to posting pics of the various farm babies and other iphone pictures of interest since February. It seems as soon as the goat kids and piglets popped out I knew I had to post their pics but just haven't found the time. Well, here goes.

Jeremy with a new barbados lamb back in December.

me scratching monster's belly. he's a bottle baby, his mom had too small a pelvic bone for birth and he had to be pulled with an obstetrical snare. we lost the rest of his litter and his mom had to take up residence in our freezer. but out of the bottle feeding we got the nicest baby pig you could wish for. He has been a cute little honker to have around.

Our egg operation in full glory just after moving down from the spot behind the photographer. It was in the middle of the pasture 2 weeks before that, where you can see the bare spot near where one of the coops were. That's what chickens do to the grass around their coop where they hang out all day and why you have to move the coop if you want to have superior eggs. you either have to move the coops or pray that the "local" movement will help sell your eggs since they aren't much better than a CAFO.

Eggmobile2 after its retrofit. Chicken farmers have to replace their flocks at 2 years when their laying tapers off and they eat more money in feed than they make in eggs. That gives me a perfect opportunity to fix the things I didn't like about my 2nd coop. It got new water tanks, and nipples inside and out, which are much more sanitary and less failure prone than the gravity based waterers.

Tamworth litter. Only one gilt though, the rest were barrows. We learned how to fix them, not nearly as bad as I'd thought. I sold the gilt for a weaner price to a nice lady who wanted to breed her. Next litter I will have the confidence to sell the best ones for a higher price as breeding stock.

Cinnamon's twins: sugar and nutmeg, still wet from being born. We had 9 kids out of 4 does and it never got boring. I guess we are doing something right.

Meat chickens on pasture. More water nipples. These things are a labor saver and the consistent water that never fails is a plus for consistent bird size and good growth throughout.

Between brooder room and eggmobile we grow out pullets in these things I call "hoop tractors" of my own design. I have to move them with a tractor. This eggmobile2 replacement flock had some nice birds in it, this RI Red climbed me while I was moving their shelter.

She knows the best place to ride. Thank God for coffee btw. Just noticed it and thought I'd mention how much I love it.

OK blog. Sorry about the neglect. I think your problem is that you aren't a living thing, those have to take priority over you, simply a bunch of typed words and linked images.

2011 chicken season email

2011-02-28T10:47:00.001-08:00

Dear Customers and Friends,

I am pleased to announce the schedule for my pasture fed chicken
program this year. I know many of you are hooked on our high standards
and I apologize for making you wait so long for this announcement.
We've been busy! We now have a new farm in Sebastopol with excellent
soil (but no driveway, water, or power yet :) and we'll be farming our
chickens on that good grass starting in just a few weeks. Now our
investments in topsoil through careful ecosystem management will
permanently benefit our own programs.

Because we supplement the natural forage diet with the highest quality
USA grown organic grains from Modesto Milling, we need to raise our
price slightly to $5.50/lb this year to ensure the viability of this
program.

Chickens will be available on the following dates:
4/10 & 4/17
5/8 & 5/15
6/5 & 6/12
7/3 & 7/10
8/7 & 8/14
9/4 & 9/11
10/2 & 10/9
11/6 & 11/13
12/4 & 12/11

Those are all Sundays, but customers will also be able to pick their
chicken from that harvest up on Monday for convenience. After that
self-pickup out of the walk-in is arrangeable for emergencies but is
discouraged.

If you like a smaller chicken 3.5 - 4 lbs then try to order from the
first week. The second week birds tend to be a little bit larger,
4-4.5. But there are always larger ones in the first harvest and
smaller ones in the second so don't worry too much about this
guideline.

In other news, I have a few lambs available that will be harvested
next month. My sheep are hair sheep, they shed out their wool when the
weather warms up, so they do not have the strong lamb/lanolin flavor
that some people when they've tried lamb have decided they do not
like. Give mine a try in that case, the flavor is out of this world
and you will broaden your cooking horizons as you seek recipes for the
various cuts you will receive. I only sell whole live lambs so they
can be harvested onsite for minimum stress. The price is still $3/lb
on the live weight so its around $7-8/lb once all the butchering is
done and paid for. I ask for a $40 deposit to reserve your lamb.

It is with great pleasure and excitement that I make this announcement
to open the 2011 chicken. Now, let the hard (but rewarding) work
commence!

sincerely,
-marc

p.s. if you want to be removed from my mailing list please reply to this
email with some words to that effect and I will make it happen. alternately,
if you know people who like local high quality food, I have expanded my efforts
this year and would welcome new customers. thanks!

harvested today

2011-02-17T20:12:00.000-08:00

We had a goat and lamb harvest today. I was quite pleased with the sizes, most lambs broke the 60 lb barrier which is what I'm shooting for in the hair sheep. You might wonder why I farm such small lambs, when wool breeds easily get 80 lbs or more? Well, some people really dont like that strong lamb/lanolin flavor, and my hair sheep don't have it. So most of my lamb customers can't believe the mild and delicious flavor and they come back for more.

Sorry for the squeamish about this pic, but this is how a stress-free lamb graduation ceremony looks when its done on farm. They get to meet their maker with a minimum of fear.

Here's a pic of Nate the other day doing one of his favorite things. I'm looking forward to the help of this farm hand:

for now though, this is pretty good Nate and Daddy time:

its been a while

2011-02-05T04:39:00.000-08:00

Here's us in the middle of moving the eggmobiles on the new farm. All but eggmobile2 are moved to their new location. Eggmopbile4 is red (youngest birds) Em1 is yellow (second youngest) Em3 is blue (second oldest), Em 2 is green (oldest), with the tractor connected in foreground. Em2's replacement birds are on pasture in the hoop tractors in the deep background which have been depicted in previous blog posts.

Carrie is grabbing a feeder in the old pasture. We have adjusted the space we give each flock, the old birds need less pasture and the young birds more, you can see the pasture degrading as it fades into the background.

Jeremy turned 7. We had his birthday in conjunction with another kid in his class so as to help minimize the amount of birdthay parties for the class this year...

And finally, they got hold of the entire bottle of bubble bath. Yup, daddy checks his email for one second and this is what happens:

dreams of my daughter

2010-12-12T23:19:00.000-08:00

I was sitting at my computer, poking around on the website. I had posted a new testimonial, updated some pics, responded to a comment on the blog, and I heard from upstairs little feet get out of bed and run towards mommy and daddy's room. Since I was up, I intercepted to preserve mommy's sleep.
"What's a matter Maddie?"
"I had a really bad dream"
"oh what was it about?"
"there was a so scary bird with a really long beak. It was so scary. And there were so many chickens, everywhere"

oh dear, what have I done?

thanksgiving eve

2010-11-24T20:32:00.000-08:00

All the customers have their thanksgiving birds. Despite not taking deposits, or being able to really properly count the birds, I ended up with just the right amount of birds and sizes of birds. All the customers got a bird or birds they were happy with and I had one each for my two pasture landlords and everyone went away happy. Whew! On top of it all, we had a third lamb today!

That's right, we have a skewed lambing season. I dont know why, probably because this pair of ewes I had matured and bred later than I realized. I thought I'd have lambs mid summer but instead I had them in November. The first pair came on Veteran's day. We thought they were going to come the Saturday before that, I got a txt during my kids' violin recital, but that turned out to be a vaginal prolapse. It was her first lambing, it was twins, and they were takin up all the space. The oncall vet was good 'ol Sarah that I photographed caring for Shawna the goat last spring. She said I could pick up a device and tie it to the wool on my own but I decided to spring for her visiting and luckily I did because hair sheep have no wool to tie a "ewe saver" to and she ended up putting in a couple of sutures to hold it in place, which held everything else in place. We had to re-tie it once, and that pretty much lasted until the day she lambed, when she managed to bust it into pieces. So I sent Carrie to get another one and install it, but then I got a call on Veterans day, around 4:30, that it was happening and I better get down there fast. We had reservations at Nick's Cove and Mary was on a walk but Sarah agreed to drive her down there when she got home so I loaded the kids in the minivan and got on down to Rose and Thorn, where I'm leasing some pasture (but I need to get out of there ASAP, its very wet there).

So we got there and Sarah and Elena were watching, and they said they had seen head and hooves but the ewe saver that is not supposed to interfere seemed to get in the way and it all went back in. Decided to phone the vet again, he said to go ahead and take the new ewe saver out, asked should I pull the lamb out and he said yes, should I wash my hands, yes, is purell OK? yes. So Sarah Silva reached in and pulled the lamb out. Boy. Then she had the next one all by herself. Mary arrived between the first and the second one but Jeremy and Madeline got to see both. It was pretty magical. Today, the sister (#4) of the mom of the twins (#5) had a lamb. The new one is a ewe. Sorry meat customers, looks like we are still building our flock :) Since Ram Sam Sam was the dad I guess we'll be breeding the new ewes in about a year to Sammy Jr., or maybe the Katahdin Ram I haven't named yet.
some lamb pics (lighter one is the boy, born first, darker one is the girl, born second):

November 2010 will always be remembered by me as the month of getting stuck in the mud. Lets see if I can remember all the times I've been stuck in the mud...The first time was after the big rain, when I was trying to stay out of the mud and I'd seen Sarah during the big rain drive the path by the forest from the house's rock driveway at Rose and Thorn in the middle of the big rain and we had a bunch of stuff for the pigs in the back so I decided to take it. Natalie was in the passenger seat and when I slipped off the path into the ditch she said "this is exactly where Sarah got stuck yesterday." I have to admit I went bananas on her for not mentioning that little tidbit of knowledge. She defended that since Sarah and I talked often she assumed I knew that already. Well I didn't and speaking up would have been the smart thing to do I still think. I got stuck deep in the ditch by that road that slopes to the ditch and wasted half a day first trying with John's tractor to pull me out and then waiting for AAA to get me out, which they did easily, but then I spent another day getting base rock from Canyon Rock and fixing mess I had made along with the original problem I might add. I also put base rock over the culvert where we normally enter. Which the construction guys that are parking their massive trucks there should have done but they dont seem all that great if you ask me. I'll never hire that guy for sure. He just put regular dirt over that culvert and that was just stupid. First time it rained that created a muddy mess. Which Sarah and I swept up once we had that fixed with base rock. We are conscientious tenants and land stewards...

Second time I got stuck was trying to bring the water trailer home from Salmon Creek Ranch where the layers are, I thought it was dry enough to go all the way in and turn around, but no, I found a muddy spot and got stuck, but was able to dig myself out and put boards down but had to leave the water trailer there. Meanwhile the tanks in the eggmobiles got lower and lower, so finally one day I dedicated to getting the water trailer and the livestock trailer out. Another backstory is that we had big rain in October, 10" in one weekend, and we couldn't get an adequate shelter for the pigs. I was at a strategic planning retreat for City Slicker Farms and texted Sarah that my flatbed trailer still had too much hay on it to move her a-frame and anyway I was not available so she could use my livestock trailer for the hog shelter. But instead of backing it in just to the border she drove it straight into the middle of the hog pasture! When I saw this I had her adjust the fence so that at least the hogs couldn't muddy up the spot in front of the trailer, but still there was no good way out of that pasture with my one livestock trailer that I depended upon to get all my animals out of that floodplain! So the day that was finally 4 or 5 days since rain that I decided Natalie and I would spring the water trailer was also the day we would get the livestock trailer out or die trying. We put several pieces of scrap siding from eggmobile4 in the pickup and 3 big pieces of 1" plywood that had been the deck of the flatbed that became em4. This was November 15th, the day of a Zazu farmer lunch that I had donated a turkey and 2doz eggs to and didn't want to miss. We got the trailer out of the pasture no problem but then we had to go through a narrow path in the forest that had a wet spot on the right side and I thought I could stay left enough but the trailer slid to the right and got buried to its axles. We spent 3 hours digging, putting wood down, backing up, putting wood down, moving forward, putting wood down, getting the mats out of the trailer, putting them down, digging, emptying the trailer of all the pig-shit/straw, putting that down, getting that out of the wheels where it got all seriously stuck, chainsawing blackberry canes into our knuckles and getting constantly whapped in the ass by blackberries, digging, putting wood down, backing up, digging, going forward etc. you get the picture. We fought and sweated and bled for every inch we moved that trailer until we got it free. And we did get it free.

here's Natalie and I with John's mule which got the job done. We were seriously proud. Natalie was a trooper and never complained once about the hell we were going through. I complained incessantly of course:

She and I earned the special sushi lunch we ate that day. But we missed the Zazu lunch by two hours. Oh well. Luckily Mary covered for us for the first 10 minutes of chicken pickup time. Sorry we were late Uni...

OK, so that was the second time I got majorly stuck. The third time was the night before the Thanksgiving Turkey harvest, I tried to drive the truck up to the turkey pen. I had all that wood at Rose and Thorn because of the stock trailer fiasco, and so I thought I could put it down in the one wet spot between road and turkeys and drive right up to them. I had my parents in the truck to help and didn't want to borrow the mule after dark and make noise at the barn that might bother John and Carole. Oops. there was another wet spot and I buried the front wheels of the truck to the axles. So my parents and I went through hell putting boards down, jacking the truck up, digging out huge areas to put the big 1" plywood pieces down, and doing that for all 4 wheels. Sarah Silva had a cold but she came down to help anyway so now I owe her bigtime. Once we got all the wheels on wood (this took hours, there were too many challenges to list) we connected the mule to the back of the truck with the pull chains and I gave the 3-2-1 signal and revved the engine for all it was worth as the mule pulled mightily but nothing happened. Oops, I was in neutral. got it in reverse and we got out of it no problem, re-adjusted the wood for the first wet spot but still managed to get stuck in that spot a second time but getting out only took 15 minutes this time, part of why we got stuck is the chain came unhooked and we lost momentum with the mule pulling. OK, dont drive the truck into the RT pasture. Filling up those holes we dug is still on the todo list.

We move the chickens to their third spot at Salmon Creek Ranch, and I took some pics to put in my power point for the poultry science class at SRJC that Dr. Famini asked me to speak at. Also did some footage for a new TV show re: food that was a neat experience and the people doing it are really cool and good company. Anyway, here's what my layer operation looks like as of Nov 2010...

The last time I got stuck was just last night. I spent all day from 11-5 working on the SRJC processing presentation, actually bringing my processing trailer and 2 turkeys and everything necessary to process and sell 2 turkeys to Dr. Famini to Shone Farm to give the class some exposure to actual poultry processing. It was the only exposure they were going to get, and I love the SRJC ag program (I took IPM and Org. farming classes there) so I had no choice but to oblige. So after the long day of preparing, speaking, then processing the turkeys in the frigid wind I needed to do my evening chicken chores, because Carrie's evening was spent on turkey pickup (I was sad I missed that customer interaction, so many new customers I didn't get to connect with). We had just added another 900 lbs to the feed trailer because Sarah got 3 more wine barrels delivered to her for me from her lovely family, and so I had 2K of layer feed loaded onto the trailer and headed to the chickens at around 7:30 pm in the dark. I almost made it up the hill when the wheels started spinning and I started sliding sideways. So I decided to back up and just drop the trailer, but in backing it off the road it started jack-knifing too much, in trying to correct that I got the front right wheel into a ditch that I couldn't get out of and the jack of the trailer prevented me backing up. Sarah Silva came out and picked me up before milking her goats. I got it out this morning by trailering up my tractor with Robert who was hired to work on 2 pig pens but instead spent half the day getting my truck out and getting my feed up the hill (with the tractor).

So that's my November. I really need my own land with some more gentle slopes, sandy well drained soil and some hard packed roads.

moved to winter pasture

2010-10-17T19:46:00.000-07:00

hmm, where does the time go? we finished egg-mobile3 and moved the birds from hoop-tractor1 into it, then we sold the birds from egg-mobile1 and only had to cull 10 of them. We tore out the floor to put the correct size wire in it (that was the first one I'd built), cleaned out the water tanks and put in nipple waterers instead of the plasson bell waterer. We also re-painted to make it as cheerful as em3. Then we moved in the birds from hoop-tractor2. Whew! Now I am working on eggmobile4. And none too soon, the birds have begun to lay already...

Also importantly we filled out all the paperwork to start selling our eggs to Whole Foods. We heard they put a laser thermometer on the eggs when they arrive to make sure they get there at 45 degrees. Kind of cool. I was very impressed with how they wanted to tour my operation before they would agree to sell my eggs. That is very cool. Some friends warned us that our egg price was too low. When I look at the feed bills from Modesto Milling, I am sure that they are right and that we are losing money just on the egg business alone. Next year we will keep good records and find out just how much we are losing and what price we need to be at to break even. For now, I just want to get people in Sonoma County to taste some real pasture fed eggs. Not just eggs from chickens that are let outside to eat, but eggs from chickens that are kept in clean, mobile coops and supplemented with free choice oyster shell, captured rainwater, and modesto milling organic feed. And are as beautiful and well presented as ours.

Plus, in our new winter pasture courtesy of salmon creek ranch, they now have a view...

oops where did June go?

2010-07-27T19:23:00.000-07:00

Hi Blog. sorry I neglect you. simple fact is, when I neglect you you don't die or suffer. Maybe I lose readers, but I'm not blogging to have lots of readers. Why am I blogging? who knows...

Anyway, I was back east for a family wedding a few weeks ago and Adele (Mary's sister) gave me grief again for being the worst blogger ever. So here I am, posting again, because I respond well to criticism I guess.

Truth is, I was procrastinating the next post because of the big news, and some unmade decisions. The big news is that we got our first full time employee! Her name is Natalie and she's the one I was waiting so long for. I was so afraid of bringing someone new into the household that I basically just waited until someone fell into my lap, someone who was working on a farm far away but came a couple of times to volunteer for chicken harvest. She was taking the bus and had to stay overnight to do it, so she spent time with the family and I was sure it was going to work out. When she and Jeremy and I hauled all the compost in the wheel barrow for middle field I knew she could handle hard work. When she let Jeremy talk her ear off while she was washing eggs I knew she was going to get along with the kids. Jeremy and Madeline always fought over who got to sit next to her at dinner and still do.

Here's a picture of wonderful Natalie:

what's that in the background you ask? Yup, we have pigs again. I have 3 breeder gilts (2 berkshires and 1 tamworth) and Sarah Silva has 3 breeder Tams (2 gilts and a boar). I also have 4 meat pigs (2 tams, 2 berks) and Sarah has 3 meat pigs in this batch (1 tam and 2 berks). We were fairly disappointed that there weren't more Berkshire market pigs for us but he gave them to someone else because apparently Sarah wasn't clear that we were going to pick them up for sure when she talked to him. We are always going to send a deposit from now on when we commit to animals.

I also mentioned there was a decision I was trying to make. I had picked up these guard dogs that hadn't been kept with livestock like they were supposed to be. They started out as a real pain in the butt. They had no vaccinations, no training, and they were not bonded to sheep like I wanted. The female (I can't use the "b" word though I know I should) liked to chew hoses and I swear she was breaking in the garden and tearing it up just out of spite. She killed one of Sarah's ewe lambs and I felt so bad I had to give up my St. Croix ewe lamb to compensate. Any way, I got rid of her to someone who wanted a pet dog like her, after paying for grooming and all the vaccinations and I gave her away free. Now the male, Leo, is earning his keep protecting the meat chickens from the weasel. We've lost 1 meat bird while he was watching that looked like weasel and in 6 weeks that's not bad. Here's a pic of Leo:

I had taken some other pics, in June when I finished some chicken housing that I'm calling "hoop tractor" for starting pullets until they are ready to lay and move into an "eggmobile" on a trailer. Basically its a way to get them out on grass while they are still small enough for hawks to eat them. I never did get the pics out or make the blog post. It was a busy time. But I want you to know how I protect the birds between week 12 and week 20 when they are laying and ready to replace the prior flock that is getting culled. I move these things by dragging it with a tractor or John's Kawasaki "mule" (he is the landlord of my current farm lease) every 3 days or so.

OK, so that's it for now, can't possibly write about everything. Something you want me to write about? Let me know. As I said, I need more reasons to spend time on this.

Mother Earth confirms pasture-fed eggs are healthier!

2010-05-26T21:26:00.000-07:00

A volunteer forwarded me a link to Mother Earth News' information regarding eggs and the benefits of letting the chickens out on fresh pasture (especially by moving them around, they will quickly turn a covered stationary "yard" into conditions similar to a factory farm). I'm going to cut and paste the whole article...

http://www.motherearthnews.com/Relish/Pastured-Eggs-Vitamin-D-Content.aspx

The results from Mother Earth News’ latest round of pastured egg nutrient tests are beginning to come in. So far, pastured egg producers are kicking the commercial industry’s butt — woo hoo, go free range! We’ve invested a lot of time and energy over the last few years in researching the differences between the meat and eggs coming out of the commercial industry and those produced by conscientious farmers who let their animals graze on fresh pastures. In the past, we’ve found that eggs from hens raised on pasture, as compared to those commercially raised factory farm eggs, contain:

• 1⁄3 less cholesterol
• 1⁄4 less saturated fat
• 2⁄3 more vitamin A
• 2 times more omega-3 fatty acids
• 3 times more vitamin E
• 7 times more beta carotene

Now we’re looking at vitamin D, which many of us do not get enough of because we don’t spend any time outdoors, and even when we do we use sunscreen that blocks vitamin D production. (More about that here.) Eggs are one of the few food sources of naturally occurring vitamin D, and we wondered if true free-range eggs might be higher in this important vitamin, too. Our latest tests show that pastured eggs have anywhere between 4 to 6 times as much vitamin D as typical supermarket eggs.

So … (1) Get out there and eat some fresh farm eggs! and (2) Check out our ongoing pastured egg research here

OK, that wasn't in the plan

2010-05-18T19:02:00.001-07:00

Got a call from my landlord of the layer chickens today. How ironic that this morning I just posted pics of their nice home next to the forest. Well, some of that forest decided to fall over. A huge ash took out 4 other trees on its way to landing right in between my two chicken coops. Clearly God loves my chickens but likes to keep me busy. I spent the entire afternoon keeping two chainsaws very busy but I did manage to free one of the three sections of fence that was smashed by trees. Not cheap fence, but hopefully I can get there tomorrow in time to free another section before his tree guys come and brutalize it with their chainsaws.

Look at how perfectly those trees came down right in between the two coops. What a miracle!

Not a single chicken was injured. But this kind of thing is why my eggs are the best. This is why markets need to be scheduling phone calls with me when I offer them the privilege of offering my eggs to their customers. This is why there are no bulk discounts! These eggs move to pristine pastures and those places are alive with activity instead of sterile and safe concrete boxes. Sometimes, that activity comes crashing down on me though and I need to drop everything to protect the chickens from that which comes lurking in the night.

egg cartons

2010-05-18T07:36:00.000-07:00

Yesterday there was a radio program about bottled water that I heard a snippet of while driving home from my newest lease. When I repositioned eggmobile1 by the way it was tilted wrong and the water overflowed the gutter on the opposite side of the water tank and I wasted all of yesterday's storm without collecting any water :( But the new property they are on is on a creek next to a huge forest, a very beautiful old orchard, lovely forage for the chickens, and full of wildlife (and predators) so its a good test of my electric-net fences. They've been there almost a week and so far so good. All this driving back and forth wears a farmer down, but having small properties is the fact of California so I've gotta make this farming model work. Also, the eggs are better this way. Just when your pathogens and predators think they know the drill...

eggmobile2

eggmobile1

Back to the radio, the speaker was lamenting the recycling of plastic water bottles. They are made from petroleum, and always made fresh. When we recycle water bottles he said, they are almost always shipped across the sea to china and "down-cycled" into carpet batting and other parts of things, but never back into water bottles. Apparently there is one company thinking about building a plant to "close the loop" but this hasn't happened yet.

Enter my egg cartons. They are made from recycled water bottles. OK, its not a water bottle, but its a product being purchased here in the U.S. and its clear PETE plastic containing a food product just like the original water bottle, so its closer to closing the loop than carpet batting. It is labeled with a 1 on the bottom so it can be recycled again. I am not aware if carpet batting gets recycled. I need to look into where these cartons are manufactured, that's the one thing, if its happening in China that's sad. Anyway, I got the clear ones because they display the colorful dozen that is so superior to anything else on the market, but I also knew that providing a market for recycled materials here in the U.S. is a good thing. When we get rid of plastic water bottles, I will stop using plastic cartons from the recycled product.

Weds and Thursday last week I worked back to back 17 hour days acquiring new sheep because of customer demand, so now I can start taking orders for fall lambs because I got 14.5 more sheep in 2 days. All hair sheep (8 are barbados, 5 whethers, 3 ewes, the rest are St. Croix). The half sheep is because Silva Star and I are sharing a St. Croix ram because we got someone's entire flock. I also picked up 2 Italian sheep dogs called "Maremmas" from someone who couldn't keep them anymore. They are a year old and unfortunately aren't yet bonded to sheep like they should be, so its going to take some work, but they are very good with the sheep already, they do not harass the lambs at all. I have been working non-stop every day since then so I haven't taken any pics yet, but I'm going to try to get that done in the next few days.

Lastly but not leastly, poor Madeline was playing on the swing (standing) and fell off forward and broke her arm a little. I say a little because the doctor said its a very small fracture and the cast only needs to be on a week. Still, its uncomfortable for her, and she was very frustrated about it. She seems to be getting used to it now. She wanted me to take this picture of her and Ruby.

May harvests are done

2010-05-11T08:31:00.000-07:00

Whew, another month's worth of chicken harvests are done. Now I can finally focus on getting some plants in the ground and moving my chickens to another location again. I just can't use the property they are on now because the semi-dwarf orchard is too modern and the trees are too close together. can't farm chickens in the rows, and I was able to put the eggmobiles on the edge of the orchard and run the nets towards the inside, with the plan of going all around the orchard on the road like that, but now the neighboring orchard has run his disc through it all and it would appear he owns the entire backside up to the treeline, so that is out. Hooray for layer coops on wheels that are road-worthy.

When you are thinking about volunteering for a chicken harvest at Felton Acres, but are a little intimidated that you might not be able to do it, you can reflect on the following photo of a volunteer from this week. We just love our volunteers, they add so much good conversation and fun to every single harvest, and this week was no exception. Thank you very much to all of our past volunteers.

liver pate

2010-05-04T21:10:00.000-07:00

I was getting a little burned out on working. I tried to have a day off on Sunday and I managed to not work for about two hours. So today again by afternoon I was really dragging, so I decided to cook that liver pate recipe I mailed out to customers a couple of weeks ago. I had a few extra livers from some necks that mysteriously disappeared and 2 from the dinner we had Sunday for Mary's Dad & Stepmom being in town, and one from the chicken we are having later this week. (Mysteriously we eat a lot of chicken) From the LA Times:
http://www.latimes.com/features/food/la-fo-sos-20100311,0,5055248.story

Anyway, I went to whole foods for the pancetta and a baguette. Came home and patted the livers down and removed the connective tissues and patted the livers down and salted and peppered them no problem. These tasks were apparently well within my culinary abilities. Since I only had 1/2 lb of liver I substituted the "large saucepan" for the non-stick frying pan I use to cook eggs because I am comfortable with it and its non-stickness. I threw in the 1/4 cup oil when the pan was hot, and then started putting the livers in, and the fun began. Little firecracker sounds and explosions of oil started hitting me as I tried to sneak more livers into the pan. Mary was attracted to the commotion and wandered over only to be splattered. She yelped and I wouldn't say "yelled" "you can't deep fry in that pan, get the big one" so I pulled out the huge red Le Crueset but she screamed "not that one, on the lower left! aughhh" she got hit again. I pull out the pan and I'm like "what do I do now?" and Mary, calmer now, "just dump it in and keep going, you'll be fine"

Feeling sorry for me, Mary helped me by chopping the garlic and zesting and juicing the lemon while I fried livers and chopped scallions. Also she told me when the pancetta fat was rendered and what it meant to shake the pan to deglaze. The rest of the preparation was straightforward but all things considered cooking is pretty stressful. I couldn't believe how yummy it was though and ate crostini after crostini of the stuff, heaping it on with a spoon. Delicious. Washed down with a certified organic amber ale from Eel River Brewery. Now I was really feeling lethargic. But my goats and pregnant ewes needed some daily grain, and the mutt roosters I plan on selling to Western were outta food, and the thanksgiving turkeys needed their droppings pan dumped and re-bedded. back to the grind.

As I was out there I remembered another topic I have completely forgotten to blog about: my 2 new beehives. I had read this book by Novella Carpenter a while back called "Farm City" and it made me want bees, and one day early in spring I couldn't resist the "Order bees now" sign in front of beekind. I now have 2 hives of Italian bees.

I picked them up with Jeremy on Saturday April 17. I talked to Doug about his video online where he defies most of the videos you'll see and just places the package inside the hive instead of shaking the bees out. He offered to show me one that he had placed just a few hours earlier, sure enough, almost all of the bees were out. I brought the bees home, tractor'd the 2 hives out to the middle of the "lower field" that is in the middle of the orchard, and commenced, Jeremy in tow, to remove the can of syrup and pull out the queen cage. I think in Doug's video he does it all without protective gear so I, being a fully macho man, intended to do the same. I hadn't noticed the subtle nuance however of shaking most of the bees off the queen cage before you brush the last 1 or 2 off with the wad of grass, so I went at this mass of bees on the queen cage with my wad of grass and immediately got stung on the finger. OUCH! and reflexively tossed the queen cage on the ground. Oops, left the gloves back in the barn. With gloves on I recovered the queen cage and was able to remove the cork, plug the hole with a marshmallow, and put the package in the hive for both hives. The next day though it seemed like most of the bees were still inside the package, so I ended up shaking them out. I also noticed one of my queens had already been released, I think I didn't jam the marshmallow in tight enough. I didn't even check the other queen cage, just filled up the feeders and closed it up.

Yesterday I finally checked on the bees again. Feeders were totally empty. Lots of larvae so it looks like both queens were accepted. But in both hives I had major beespace violations and they had built their own triangle shaped combs in the open space in the middle where the queen cage was. I removed these, thinking they were bad and also empty, but when I got them up to the house I saw in one of them each cell had a tiny egg in it or a tiny larva. Oops. I probably should have just left all that since it was their brood super anyway. Well, hopefully they just get over it and with the frames pressed closer together they don't build another one of those unframed combs. I should seek out an online forum of beekeepers to whom I can ask questions before I go undoing all the wonderful work the bees are doing. They really are a miraculous animal though. I love all sorts of creatures. I just wish I had a few more of me to go around...

My eggs ARE the best

2010-05-03T09:25:00.001-07:00

This I believe: my eggs are the best in Sonoma County. It has been bothering me lately that people want to lump other eggs in with my eggs simply because they are local or raised on a small farm, when the coop that those chickens live in is fixed in a single place. That just is NOT a comparable product to my eggs, which come from chickens housed in mobile facilities. Chickens are great foragers but they are also prey items with a limited range they'll go from their safe haven. Eventually, they eat all the good food in and around their coop and the quality of the eggs goes down. Because my chickens are in trailers surrounded by electro-plastic net fences and they get frequently moved to fresh ground, this problem does not happen. Also, the orchards in which I graze my chickens greatly benefit from their presence. Also, pathogens attracted to chickens get cut off from their chicken supply way before they ever get established. Yes, this is a labor intensive way to raise an animal that notoriously doesn't make you much money. But once you achieve a certain scale I believe it can be valuable, and also this is such an important food, a key ingredient in so many dishes, and a chance to have a truly differentiated product over the competition. Not all LOCAL, small farm eggs are equal!

Here's a picture of me collecting my beautiful eggs:

When in my travels I see an inferior product selling for a higher price than I'm selling for it bothers me. So I'm increasing my egg price to $6.69. That won't completely solve the problem (I see plenty of eggs selling for $8 that aren't as pretty or guaranteed from mobile coops like mine) but it is closer to their real value. The only risk of trying my eggs is getting spoiled on anything else.

felton acres welcomes its first lamb!

2010-04-30T12:10:00.001-07:00

There we were, moving chickens and feeding and doing our evening chores, and I looked down at the sheep for a moment and exclaimed "OMG, we had a lamb!" You gotta love Barbados Blackbellies. No suplemental grain, no lambing barn, no sleepless night. Just looked down at the sheep and saw the cutest little lamb among the now pretty big looking crew. Brought the kids down the next day with the nice camera for the evening chores and snapped a few pics. Even zoomed they are not great because mommy is being very protective and hanging back. Good job Ram Sam Sam and Ghoully Ghoully Ewe!

is commercial fishing bad? NO!!!

2010-04-27T09:10:00.000-07:00

I was just responding to a letter to the editor in a magazine, but somehow it turned into an essay, so why not add to my poor neglected blog with another of my enviro-rants?
enjoy...

I read with some pain the letter in your May 2010 issue calling for an end to the commercial harvest of wild fish. Yes, the previous letter calling for an end to all sport fishing so there would be more fish for the non-boat-owning population was also wrong, but Mr. Johnstone's opinions about what's wrong with commercial fishing were incorrect enough as to force a response.

The summary of Mr. Johnstone's argument is that because technology for fishing is so advanced, humanity is incapable of sustainably harvesting wild fish; in essence the greed of commercial fishers has no antidote, they will always over-fish if allowed to fish at all. This is the "tragedy of the commons" argument. More people need to understand that this was an argument created by the super-rich to take the commons away from everybody so they could expand their exclusive hunting grounds. The commons were doing just fine when commoners had little plots of garden and a few animals grazing to put a little something extra on their tables. They had a vested interest in preserving it and they did just that. But back to fishing.

There IS an antidote to overfishing: it is called fisheries science, regulation, and enforcement. Nevermind some people do not think government is capable of anything (while they depend upon it every day for so many many things); that too is a hypocritical viewpoint. If your regulators aren't doing their jobs well then what are you doing to force them to improve? There are several examples of fisheries that are commercially harvested and THRIVING. Look at the Pacific salmon fishery in Alaska or the Halibut fishery in the Pacific Northwest. Lobster in the Northeast. (OK, those traps are not efficient and very leaky thus sustainable, but that's because of regulation and enforcement, likely mostly by the fishermen themselves, that those are the only allowed pots). When the Sacramento river Fall chinook run collapsed, smart people blamed everything but commercial fishing and commercial fishing interests have supported the total ban on their activities until the stocks rebuild. They have a vested interest in preserving the stock in perpetuity. That's how incentives really work here, the science just needs to be plain and accurate. And we can put people on the moon if we want to and fund it.

The most dangerously incorrect assertion followed: that fish FARMING is more sustainable than harvesting the wild ocean; that farming the ocean which we barely understand and do not live in is comparable to farming on land. This could not be further from the truth. There are at least 2 huge unsolved problems with fish farming (it is my belief they can NEVER be solved until we have lived in the ocean for three generations): 1) concentrations of a single species in a small confined area concentrates both waste and pathogens which then cannot be contained in the pens basically making dump-sites and dead zones 2) even if you solve that problem (more or less) by keeping the pens way way out to sea and diluting the pollution with miles of open ocean, you have to feed the fish baitfish that have been commercially harvested, thus robbing the wild populations of their forage resource. In the case of salmon for example, feeding them baitfish means they are going to get 100% of their food from a "trophic level" (each rung on the food chain ladder is one trophic level, algae/diatoms->copepods->krill->herring->salmon) just below themselves where in the wild they often eat 2 trophic levels down. At each trophic level you lose efficiency. Its simply much more efficient to let wild populations of fish do their thing and then harvest them with small artisanal fishing craft (which could be mandated by law). There are some efforts to fix this one by genetically modifying salmon to eat corn, or feeding feather/bone meal from factory chicken farming, which besides being somewhat distasteful propositions are both farmed unsustainably on land and pollute the ocean with tainted runoff. Fish farming other than shellfish is a lose/lose/lose system. Shellfish is a winner because it is done in a way that mimics the natural system and nothing needs to be imported for feed or medication.

The wild ocean is a beautiful efficient system that we should interact with in thoughtful and provably sustainable ways. Fish farming other than shellfish in the ocean is a dangerous practice that should be banned outright. The "how are we going to feed the world?" argument is a ruse and should not be accepted. There are unimaginable amounts of food waste in our corporate agricultural systems right now in the name of economies of scale and due to basic human laziness. There is plenty of capacity to feed everyone if we re-diversify our land based agriculture, appropriately steward and benevolently utilize our environment. Sustainably harvesting the wild ocean with copious pleasurable jobs for millions of people world wide can be accomplished by forcing government regulators do their jobs (and have enough funds to do them) because we the people are all so well educated (by sportfishingmag). Please do not eat farmed fish. Please do insist on wild caught fish, and whenever it is a wild fishery that is certified sustainable (like Alaskan Salmon) you can feel good about putting your money there.

Marc Felton
Sebastopol, California
(sport fishing for salmon, halibut, dungeness crab, albacore tuna, and pacific rockfish out of Bodega Bay)

2010-03-27T22:13:00.000-07:00

I finally figured out a mystery cause of mortality in my chicken flock. Well, I should probably say the mystery revealed itself to me. One cost of letting chickens do what they love and live out of doors and have this outdoor housing is that you attract predators. I feel like I've had every kind: racoons, skunks, hawks, and now: weasel! Yesterday I had the kids for the day because Mary was at a board retreat, and while Nate was napping and Maddie didn't want to do chores with me due to roosters the little guy showed himself. A lot! At 10 am he was out and about looking for a way to get at those chickens, and he didn't show much fear of me. It was like he knew that there wasn't a darn thing I could do but take pictures. So I did. Ran in and got Mary's good camera and Madeline too, but of course when properly prepared he decided his recon was over and he was in the burrow planning his attack.

He ended up with one meat chicken for lunch. He bit her right on the butt, which caused a prolapse. Much like several chickens in the last batch, and solves a mystery about one of my pullets too. Time to move to the new property I just got a verbal on using that's very close to here so its a good next step.

The fact is, it is worth it to pay more to get real food. This weasel sure knows what a real chicken should taste like. I bet he'd turn his nose up at the factory farmed stuff. Shouldn't you eat as well as a weasel? With my chickens gone, he'll be forced to go back to the gophers, rats, and mice that are his usual specialty. And here I'd thought the owl boxes must be working...

baby pictures

2010-03-17T08:16:00.000-07:00

Can't really call Nate a baby anymore, and the little goats are growing fast. But Mary took some pics with her nice camera (all mine seem to be the phone these days) so I'm using it as an excuse to post to the blog.

a couple of nice pics of Nathaniel.

Flicker and Madeline.

Just can't take a nap with your goats. They seem to think you are something to climb all over. You watch your step there Andy, that's awfully close to not cool!

poor neglected blog

2010-03-15T09:42:00.000-07:00

Lately my life has been dominated by farm work, 100% completely. I got some bottle feeding dairy goats and the extra work involved has pushed me over the edge. I haven't had less than a 12 hour day, including weekend days, for the last 3 weeks. Of course, my first 2 chicken harvests were part of that, so I'd think that this would be letting up soon, but looking at my calendar for the next few days it seems unlikely. Maybe next week things will get easier.

So I haven't been posting much to the blog, the only thing I've been managing to do is post to twitter using my phone. The problem with that is just that it amounts to nothing, in the end, the Japanese word "mu-da" (nothingness) seems to best describe my time with twitter. Its very easy to post to, takes no time at all, but nothing is also what you get in return. So my new plan is to try to save up the efforts into a batch and put them in the blog, at least I will end up with a permanent record. See ya twitter.

Here's what I've been up to, in 140 words or less...

The pigs got out of the fence because it wasn't turned on, so I went with the flow and just put up more fence around them.

The pigs are happy when the sun not only comes out, but someone comes out to scratch them on the tummy.

Our Saturday ritual is waffles from scratch from Mary's family recipe. 1 cup flour, 1 cup milk, 1 grass fed egg, 1 tbsp oil, 1 tsp baking powder, 1 tbsp sugar; separate the whites from yolks, beat to peak and fold into batter at end.

Oh boy!

Baby female dairy goats have their horns removed for the safety of the person milking; it sure beats what they do to baby males (sheep, pig, cow, goat, & even some human baby boys have a rough ride at first)

I wanted nest boxes for my second eggmobile that could be slid out and dirty litter would just drop to the pasture. I was able to build that trailer myself, but it took my Dad to have the woodworking skills to do this one. Thanks Dad! (they work great!)

I took Shawna to Cotati Large Animal hospital because after 4 days she still wasn't bottle feeding. The vet confirmed I was doing it right, she speculated that leaving her with her mommy for an unusually long time was the cause. I got a lesson in tube feeding and she finally got 4 oz. in her belly. I traded her with one of Silva Star's goats that was on the bottle fine and in a few days Sarah amazingly taught her to take a bottle. Yay! But I lost my favorite La Mancha baby in trade for an Alpine mutt. Whatever; Sarah earned it.

The first chicken harvest of 2010 is in the fridge. That's real food.

Batch2 (harvest 3 & 4) are almost ready to go out on pasture. I really like the looks of this mixed batch which I have only because JM accidentally sent Silva Star a batch of Freedom Rangers by mistake, so I bought some from her.

The remaining hogs enjoying a sunny nap time. The farmer was jealous.

is it OK to eat a sentient creature?

2010-03-01T09:36:00.000-08:00

I finally was able to be concise about why I think its OK to eat meat in an email to Mary's aunt. I liked it enough that I decided to post it here, questionable vocabulary and all.

OK Anne,
can't wait to discuss it over wine. the executive summary is that I believe in God. Who am I to criticize the food chain that God set up and put into motion? God gave us a special responsibility in that food chain to be good stewards of it. I don't believe opting out is the best way to do that. IMO it is a cop-out for people who feel powerless to think they have some power. Really they are just supporting bad farming practices of taking a wonderful diverse ecosystem and grinding it up and planting a single vegetable there in a monoculture, not even using livestock for fertility. God never farms without livestock, so I don't think we should either. Eating that livestock delivers the immortality that we are all after. What lamb wouldn't like to be part of a child that may some day cure cancer, bring world peace, or figure out how to change the food system so that we can begin repairing the damage we have done to the environment?

As for the sentience of an animal, well, we ALL gonna die someday, and out in the wild they are going to die in fear and pain at the mercy of a merciless predator, or a minivan bumper, or starvation, or if they are tough and lucky, old age. 1000s of years ago many animals "decided" that a partnership with these god-like humans was a better way to go. They get all the comforts of life that we ourselves find so indispensable, shelter, secure food, water and physical safety, and some love and attention every once and a while. Then they go to God. Who am I to deny them that option? I think I'd choose it myself, given the farmer was like me. I invite anyone who thinks all livestock should be freed today to head out in the woods butt naked and make themselves a life with nothing...see if they don't come crawling back right about dinnertime.

thanks,
-marc

what if?

2010-02-24T02:39:00.000-08:00

I can't sleep because I have an idea knocking around in my head. Obviously I'm passionate about the environment, I've decided to focus the rest of my life's work on it, and I've (along with many others) identified the food system as the major problem within that to work on solving. It all started when I caught wind of the local Whole Foods getting beaten to a pulp on a local internet forum. I'm not thinking they are the solution to our food/environmental woes by any means, but I find it hard not to jump to the aid of ANYONE getting unjustly stoned in public. I mean that in the old-testament sense! If what they were saying was true, or even made sense, it might have been ignorable, but no, these folks were spouting off in the most inflamatory ways despite being relatively clueless about farming, food, and the economy itself. I felt it was my duty to correct the inaccuracies therein. So I did, and I didn't pull punches. I could never be in politics even though that's probably the best shot at making real change happen because I'm just not able to be likable enough. Not with my inflammatory writing style and willingness to publish-while-angry.

I asked a big question during that thread that my mind then simply wouldn't let go of. It went back to an old idea I'd had and fleshed it out just a little bit more, such that now it almost makes sense. Since I can't sleep, I'm hoping writing it down here will get it out of my head and I will be allowed to sleep. Plus, I went out to the garage and grabbed an old anti-insomnia prescription of Mary's that she let me have for a trip once, its 6 years expired but it worked on my trip so I figure I have about 45 minutes...

The question was this: what would be a viable way for me to sell whatever vegetables or meat products I produced, as much or as little as I produced, whenever they were ready to be harvested, for a fair price, me and every other small or even backyard producer? The farmer's market doesn't work, like everything else its all set up to exclude random little first years like me who just grow a tiny amount of the same thing everyone else has. They want 25% farms, 25% prepared foods, 25% crafts, 10% value added and etc you get the picture. You have to apply in advance, be on a waiting list, and pay a fee for the privilege of dealing with all that hassle. And its one day a week, so most people don't even do their real shopping there, it takes years to build a devoted following who come to get YOUR stuff if you want to be successful there. At least that's how it seems to me.

So my first idea was a full time farm market, in some central location, which operated maybe every afternoon/evening 6 days/week or something, so that people could shop there whenever they wanted. But you'd have real bootstrapping problems with that, farms wouldn't come because the customers weren't there yet, and vice versa. It just wasn't a compelling enough idea.

But this food fight on the local forum got me thinking about the economy, and unemployment, and the whole problem of lacking local manufacturing and production. We think we are saving our local economy buying stuff from Mexico or China or Chile at a locally owned independent store. Well we are not. As long as it is produced or manufactured elsewhere we are sending money out of our economy and over to theirs. For stuff we can't produce here, great, we should do that, those people need to make a living too. But there's lots we can produce here that we aren't, even though there's all these unemployed people here, there's about a million obstacles codified into law to prevent these people using their time to make and sell stuff locally. The middle men, the whole system makes sure that "production" only works for the big guys.

So what if some local whiz kid supervisor like Effren Carillo could literally re-write truckloads of legal obstacles just for our little renegade community and give us a real old-school market/bazaar? Like we could use the huge and centrally located with lots of indoor space and outdoor parking Pellini Chevrolet location and allow ANYONE who wants to just set up a table there and sell stuff any day they wanted 6 days/week. The only rule would be that it had to be produced, manufactured, grown, or created in Sonoma County. Heck, be magnanimous, throw Marin and Lake Counties in until there's critical mass and they get their own.

Lots of people would try it as a seller, because there are low costs and obstacles to doing so, and lots of buyers would check it out because they could go whenever it was convenient for them and be assured that they'd succeed in getting their shopping done (assuming the sellers were there in numbers). I might not be there with my eggs every time you go but there will always be someone there with no factory farmed eggs. So when we all have a ton of zuchini in the middle of summer, we bring it down along with everyone else. Some recently unemployed enterprising person comes through with a cart and buys them all cheaply cause supply is high and demand low, and takes them home and with the help of their backyard flock of chickens makes them into zuchini bread, which shows up piled on a table in a few days at the market and sells out. Long days and nights, but worthwhile work turning something nobody wants into something everybody wants. Not in a "certified obstacle" kitchen, but in _their_ kitchen. If people are leery about quality, ask for a sample. Be your own food inspector, right? Regular old bread made from a bunch of backyard gardens and backyard eggs is really tasty and desirable stuff, and factory made bread from elsewhere wouldn't be there.

It just seems to me that if people had a way to sell the stuff they grew or produced or made, they'd spend more time growing, producing, and making things, and less time tearing hair out or gnashing teeth about the bad economy, the job market, and the high prices at Whole Foods. If they could convert labor into cash, maybe they'd be willing to hand some of that cash to farmers, who then could afford health care coverage for their own family and maybe even to pay a living wage to an employee and get coverage for them too. Tourists might even be attracted to this market, thus turning those local products into instant exports and enriching our local economy with outside money. Wow.

Like I said, truckloads of laws are in place preventing anything like that from ever occurring in our "free" country. Food for thought...

before the storm

2010-01-17T20:09:00.000-08:00

My latest flurry of work has been about finishing my second eggmobile so I could get my flock two out into their new home. It seems only a couple per day escape the netting/hardware cloth and have to be caught when the door gets closed.

The picture below is flock one. These birds are laying well and seem happy and healthy despite the wet conditions.

I also moved the pigs before the big storm. They had pretty much finished off the first area I had them in, and the areas I added to that area, and it was time to move them before the storm pinned us down. I put them in a prior year's garden to let them tear it up and stop the weed cycle.

The sheep are now opposite the pig's new area...

2010 customer email

2010-01-06T08:39:00.000-08:00

I sent out my first email to customers and friends today. Sums up what we have available in terms of product, so I figured I'd paste it in here also...

Happy 2010 to everyone. Now is the perfect time to let you know that we've planned a ramped up season this year, as last year was a sell-out every single harvest.

This year, the first 2 Sunday/Monday afternoons most months will be chicken pickup days excluding September and October due to the dry grass season. The 2010 price for our chicken is $5.00/lb.

We will be harvesting the Saturday before pick-up this year so that the meat will have been "rested" (for tenderness) for 24-48 hours by the time you get it. The pick up times will be Sunday afternoon from 3-5 and Monday afternoon 4-6 (you don't have to tell us which window you'll come in--just place your order for that harvest). You'll get a reminder email the Friday before the harvest.

Here's the list of chicken pick-up days: March 7/8, March 14/15, April 4/5, April 11/12, May 2/3, May 9/10, June 6/7, June 13/14, July 4/5, July 11/12, Aug 8/9, Aug 15/16, Nov 7/8, Nov 14/15

In other good news, since we like variety and dislike inhumane, environmentally unsustainable, confined animal operations, we've expanded our efforts to include lamb and pork. Sure, almost all lamb is grass fed, but they are excellent mowers and fertility builders, and a very welcome addition around here. Pork rips and roots up pasture like crazy, but now we can retire our diesel powered roto-tiller, and there is no better example of inhumane animal production than intelligent hogs raised in concrete boxes. They say a pig's happiness is measured by how far up their face the mud stain goes. Ours have mud up to their ears! Fill your freezer with meat that you and mother nature can both feel good about! If you find someone to split a half hog or lamb with, you don't even need a big freezer (you just have to get rid of a few of the mystery items back in there, like the 2 year old tater tots, which is a good thing!)

The hogs and the lambs will be ready around April/May, and I am taking orders now. Lamb is priced at $3/lb and we will only sell them whole (about 70 lbs.), and pork will be $4/lb for a half hog and $3.75/lb for a whole hog (about 220 lbs.) The animals will be humanely harvested by the butcher (Willowside Meats) and then prepared according to your taste (you will call them to specify how thick you like your pork chops, how much you want made into sausage and so forth). You will be buying the live animal from us, but don't worry, you won't get it until it is packaged up and frozen, and you'll pick it up at Willowside. In addition to paying Felton Acres the price of the meat, the butcher (Willowside) charges a harvest fee (around $50/animal) as well as a "cut and wrap" fee (around $0.70/lb) which you pay directly to them. Get your orders in soon to ensure your share!

Once again, it was a pleasure farming for you in 2009 and we look forward to seeing you all when you come pick up your chickens. Thanks for being such mindful eaters!

-Mary and Marc
http://www.feltonacres.com

environment and livestock

2009-12-25T19:26:00.000-08:00

came across a good explanation of why livestock done wrong is a big part of the problem and done right it can be a big part of the solution to our little greenhouse gas problem:
"Beware of Bad Science"

A couple of days ago I realized what change I want to make over the coming year in my own life: no more CAFO meat. I will give up meat that I did not produce in a humane and environmentally sustainable manner, or source locally from a farmer I can insure did the same. There are going to be a few exceptions to this rule of course:

-I will eat what I am served as a guest in another person's home. I don't want my choices to make me a pain in someone else's a$$.

-I will eat sushi from my favorite restaurant: Hana Restaurant in Rohnert Park.

-I will eat wild caught seafood (except Chilean Seabass, Southern Bluefin Tuna, endangered species type stuff). I believe hook and line fishing has proven sustainable over 1000s of years, appropriate regulation and enforcement is the answer to overfishing, not boycotting paying fishermen for their labor. High prices for the product actually reduces "effort"/resource extraction.

Basically since I've filled the fridge with grass-fed chicken we've been pretty close to that at home, excepting for the occasional package of chicken-apple sausage from Whole Foods. Luckily for me, Mary, who was really close to this eating style already, has also signed on to this change for herself, which will make it easier. So bye-bye whole foods CAFO sausage.

I however had a bad tacqueria habit. I even used to have a McDonald's habit, until Omnivore's Dilemma turned me off on that, and now the few times I've wanted comfort food so bad I've tried it I've ended up with a stomach-ache. So that hasn't been around for me that much. But the burrito Thursday is going to be a hit. I've never really preferred falafel to schwerma at middle-eastern places. But now, that's what its going to be. The other day I was out and about at lunchtime though so I had a salad at the bar at Pacific Market. It was great! My bet is in the end I'll be gaining a lot more than I'm giving up by adding this small amount of discipline to my own eating habits.

Prius Sucks!

2009-12-25T09:38:00.000-08:00

The Prius is a great example of how consumers have a herd mentality that doesn't necessarily track proportionally with quality, value, or anything that you'd think rational individuals would use as criteria to make their decisions. I'm as guilty as anyone. I own a 2007 Prius.

My mother bought the 1st generation Prius when it first came out, and one test drive and I knew it wasn't for me. Main complaints were that the accelerator drags on you, so unless you ride it with a lead foot all the time, you find you are going too slow on the freeway. Secondly, the brakes, with their charging feature, are so "grabby" that everyone in the car suffers mild whiplash.

But after a few years, wanting to get a car for around town or even day fishing trips with good mileage, I decided to test drive one of the later generation Prius' to see if they had solved those problems. To my delight they had, the car was zippy and responsive, and the brakes felt like any others. I bought it.

Then I found out that it is the worst car I've owned. It has been well below expectations in so many ways that I feel compelled to list them here. I believe that Toyota's design engineers made a long list of bad decisions that leads me to think that they literally despise their own customers, and our satisfaction is not high on their priority list. It is the worst car I have ever owned by FAR, and I'm including my '79 Datsun 510 wagon in that, my first car.

What sucks about the Prius? First and foremost, all this hybrid technology and money and effort has gone into this car, we have to put up with all these idiosyncrasies, for how much mileage? 40ish miles to the gallon? That's pathetic! You can do that with a regular engine and a car that is aerodynamic and light.

Actually, I think a bulleted list might be better:
-poor technology/mileage increase ratio. 45 miles/gallon is ridiculous Toyota!
-the stupid reverse beep is awful
-your passenger cannot use the GPS while the car is moving
-if you have any objects in the passenger seat, the seatbelts beep at you 3x normal duration, followed by a louder even more incessant beep. usually you give up and buckle up your items (but it wont let you operate the GPS w/ a passenger detected, oh no, not Toyota)
-The battery is in the back, but you can't open the back door if its dead.
-There is a relay for the battery up front, but you have to read the manual to know about it, and its under a plastic cover that is impossible to remove with cold fingers alone
-If you need to move your car to jump it, you are out of luck, can't get neutral w/ a dead battery AFAICT
-Toyota's answer to traction control is to separate the accelerator pedal from the engine for 1 second if it detects wheel slippage. So you go to merge into traffic, and you give it gas, but the wheel hits some sand and slips. You are half way into the street have no gas pedal, just a little orange light saying the car slipped. Thanks, idiots!
-the recall where the gas pedal and the mats are incompatible. This one I'd tolerate as just an unforseen design flaw, without all the other stuff.

I know there are more but those are the ones that I can think of for now. What a terrible car, to be so darn popular. I personally can't wait for the Chevy Volt, and I'm going to have to refuse to sell the Prius to family members because I can't let them suffer as I have. I will not buy another Toyota. Be smart; stay AWAY from Prius! These things would be tolerable for 70 or 80 miles to the gallon, but 45? Demand more from the top car company before rewarding them with your hard earned dollars...

new arrivals

2009-12-11T11:16:00.000-08:00

some new arrivals. a ram, 2 baby ewes, a baby ram, and another whether. 8 weaner pigs. Yorkshire x Hereford cross.

now I need to go fortify that pig pen...

green meat

2009-11-25T20:52:00.000-08:00

Looking back on what I've written so far, I've realized I've touched on some of the darker aspects of my fun and low impact methods of producing meat: castration, predation, slaughter, the fact that given the chance our food will escape or defend themselves with nasty pinches; in other words they are not 100% willing to be eaten at any given moment.

And yet, these are the realities of food production, animals (like us) eat other animals. Death is part of every life. I believe that these animals have some of the best lives animals could ask for. There is a bargain between farmer and crop and land in any kind of production. My feeling is that it is possible to live up to our end of that bargain to the benefit of all. They thrive so they dodge the predator attacks. Their eggs and meat taste fantastic. Personally controlling the final stages of their lives is the least I can do for them, and no "pristine state of nature" insures this type of passing the way I can. The guiding principle is to take processes that occur in nature sustainably and sustainably enhance those processes to produce viable, quality food. It doesn't have to be a zero-sum game of resource extraction and environmental quality depletion.

I have taken a few stabs at the morality of meat eating vs. vegetarianism, but I give up I can't write about stuff like that without ranting. Here's a link to a good article.
what-to-tell-vegetarians-who-say-eating-meat-is-immoral

got sheep?

2009-11-12T06:17:00.000-08:00

Crab season opened last Saturday but was accompanied by a 15ft swell from the Gulf of Alaska that kept me off the water until Monday. It was only 10ft by then. So I dropped 6 pots with a variety of baits (first time trying whole chickens that I had chucked in the freezer when they expired) out on my favorite spot north of Bodega Bay that I found several years ago by throwing pots all over the place and counting the crabs. By the time I was back to pull my first pot after a mere half hour soak, it had 4 keeper crabs in it. You gotta love the week-long sport season before commercial starts this Saturday. Once the ocean is blanketed with their pots, overnight soaking becomes a necessity almost. Certainly with rockfish closed there's nothing to do while they soak anyway. So we've been eating dungeness the last few days and once again my children have demonstrated that they are adventurous. One unfortunate thing is that Jeremy got so into helping clean the crabs that the second day I came home with them he wanted to do it all, including bringing them over to the chopping block. I put one upside down on the tailgate for him but he grabbed it with his fingers on the bottom instead of the back, so a pincher reached down and grabbed the tip of his ring finger. When he started screaming I came over and finessed the other claw away and took a terrifying moment to pry it off; they are damn strong little creatures. Subsequently I recited: I am Marc Felton. You pinched my firstborn. Prepare to die. Crabs are by far the easiest psychologically to dispatch of all the food items I have encountered.

Apparently according to someone on the local chicken chat group, it is migration season for hawks. I can testify that suddenly hawks are targeting my day-ranging laying flock. Its basically my worst nightmare, because there's no way to protect free ranging hens from interested hawks. Basically, if one gets determined, I need to find a new location, and I haven't any at the moment. How do I know they're getting attacked? About 4 or 5 days ago I went down to collect eggs and all the chickens were hiding under the coop. Uh oh, somethings attacked them. But no evidence of success like feather piles or carcassas. Then the other day I was shucking some old corncobs I'd grown as a treat before I went off to catch crabs and the orange rooster made this low guttoral moan that I now recognize as the serious alarm sound. Hens scattered running for cover. Instead of a dive bomb from high above, the hawk came sizzling in almost parallel with the ground and very low; bursting from the cover of 4 large apple trees that are clustered together just uphill of the current hang-out area. Due to the rooster warning, the hawk missed getting any bird, but it landed in a tree right above the feeder just as casual as it owned the place. Of course after the initial paralysis wore off I went running at it screaming and yelling, pushing it to another tree and another and another, until finally it was far off my property. When I was setting up for sheep yesterday another attack happened the same way. I heard the alarm, looked through the trees and fences to see the hawk doing some trick flying low to the ground, and had to run down there and chase it off. Again, unsuccessful. It doesn't look like a big hawk. It looks like a cooper's hawk, which I didn't think were large enough to take adult birds. It could be that this is another scary kind of hawk that is migrating through though. Tough to get an ID on an attacking hawk. What this tells me is that my instinct telling me to keep roosters with my flock was dead on. I am now convinced that roosters are necessary for hawk protection, and I will not keep one of my eggmobiles on land that someone has a no-rooster stipulation.

Did I say setting up for sheep? Yes, I couldn't stand watching that dryland pasture mix regrow with all that chicken fertilizer and yet nothing eating it, so I bit the bullet and got some sheep. These are not for wool, but for meat, with 2 for breeding to make more meat. Turns out you can't leave males you intend to eat intact, it gives the meat an off flavor, so I got to watch the process of actually banding one of the whethers. The breed I got is the American Blackbelly sheep and they are sooo cute in a non-white lamb sort of way. The ewe looks about 10 months old, the ram was born in September and the 2 whethers were born Oct1. They seem very happy with the forage; I saw them eat grasses etc, baby apple tree leaves, seed pods of old summer weeds gone to seed, and apples! I didn't think sheep would eat the apples but there they were last night eating apples on one side of the fence with a few turkeys dining on apples on the other side. Very cool. I looked at them at 4 am and they weren't in the shelter I'd built for them out of a raised bed cover I'd built out of PVC + tarp, they were just snuggled around the base of a tree near their water trough. Here's the latest family portrait (minus chickens).

wannabe farm update

2009-10-05T20:10:00.000-07:00

I figured this morning that its been too long since I took pics of the animals.

I recently acquired another salvage trailer for eggmobile2, and spent an hour with the drill/wire brush knocking rust off, with probably another hour left before I can hit it with phosphoric acid, then prime, then paint, then build the coop.

Here's our own wild thing tearing into a pasture fed drumstick. She really rolled her terrible eyes and gnashed her terrible teeth on the thing she held in her terrible claws. A spinach salad in the foreground from saved seeds no less. Easiest crop I ever grew, just collected seeds in a bucket and my brother spread them on a raised bed that already had irrigation. A couple weeks of neglect later and I'm cutting spinach for our salads.

Eggmobile1 is surrounded by electronet because I integrated 2 flocks into it and the new guys need the net to prevent them all roosting in trees. They are doing it anyway, but at least its not all of them. Hopefully I only have a few more nights of chicken catching and then I can remove the net and move the thing again. I doubled the ventilation with the addition of the new birds but I'm thinking I'll double it again. Really can't have too much ventilation around here since it doesn't really freeze much. I have been trying to throw them supplemental goodies as they scratched this area bare: whole uprooted tomato plants full of ripe fruit is their favorite, but they love zuchini and raw corn on the cob. Lots of neglected veggies around here.

This roo was looking like he was going to be top of the order when they first matured, and the black and white one was very timid and always running and hiding. But one day it switched, big red turned timid and b/w is now in charge.

The turkeys are much cuter than I anticipated. They have a well earned reputation for being stupid, but they are dopey in a really endearing way I think. They are very inquisitive and they look up at you with these huge blank eyes and chirp-chirp-chirp. When you try to walk away several of them gobble. Big lumbering hulks. The bronzes are getting huge and will make spectacular thanksgiving birds. The biggest narragansets will be good for those who want a smaller t-giving turkey and left the little guys unsold to sell as Christmas turkey.

Some people might think it strange that a person could love an animal, think it is amazingly cute and precious, and then at some point end its life and eat it. I however feel that life includes death, and life in the wild can be hard and cruel (ask a racoon for mercy and see what happens Mr. PETA). Life on my farm for my animals is hopefully comfortable and borderline idyllic. Then one day, graduation day, they are brought quickly and humanely to their end right here on the farm so there's not even the stress of transport. That's as close as I can get to eating a wild caught fish.
I just wouldn't enjoy a vegetarian diet, and I disagree with anyone who thinks its got a shot at being a solution to environmental problems. Yes, its been proven that some people can survive without eating other animals. But to my mind, large environmental problems will not be solved by a tiny number of people embracing and evangelating self sacrifice. Our best shot is to breed a new generation of smarter consumer who is willing to pay more for humane/green meat and a continue the spread of farmers who do it that way. Its in the farmer's instinct to be the best stewards of their land and their beasts they possibly can be. But farmers are forced by the market at this point in time to do what works.

Will there ever be a time when most eggs come from chickens that know sunlight and have ever eaten a blade of grass? Time will tell...But the eggs sure are different. Like wow different. Like you can't go back anymore different. There's a downside, what do you eat at a hotel breakfast buffet?

4 tuna monterey monday

2009-09-29T08:38:00.000-07:00

Dad and I left Monterey in Feeling Lucky at 6:30 and went to the 36'15"/122'55" spot. That's a mere 50 miles from Pt. Pinos. Waves and whitecaps started about 25 mi out. Outside was fishable but not pleasant all day.

From 15/55 started a tack south-west. At 14/56 had a triple (water temp was 62), but the usual moves produced no further fish, tacked south, then north-west, then straight east, fix a tangle, back west again at 16/47 a single, once again no subsequent fish rose in area despite several passes in a search pattern.

We gave up at 16/46 with 59 degree water and 4 15-20 lb. fish in the box.
This was another long boat ride, 3 hours to get home, not back at the house with the boat parked until 5:30.

It turns out there is a major White Sea Bass bite in Monterey and being adventurous about the target would have been a better decision. But I couldn't ignore the major tuna catch reports from Sunday and I just didn't know it was rough right past where the weather buoy said it was calm, didn't want to fiddle with a fish I didn't know how to catch and miss on a sure thing. Whatever, I like to run a boat and tuna is my favorite fish to catch. The custom 18 gallon tank we added to dad's boat makes long tuna trips like that possible, we made sure to drain the aft tank fully. Once again Feeling Lucky turned out a solid performance despite the pounding and the distance we put her through. We need to clean out the speedometer tube in the motor, that was the one system fail.

2009-09-17T09:16:00.000-07:00

Left Monterey harbor around 6 am with high hopes of catching a few tuna, but these turned into fears as soon as I got outside the bay and saw the whitecaps and felt the 10 knot wind. It was going to be a bumpy one.

My general plan was to head for 36.30/122.30 and tack SW because of the SST on tempbreak, but the break was a few miles past that. We dropped in around 9ish after the 3 hour pounding to get out there. We started working once the water was 59 degrees W/SW but were hearing radio fish at 34/57 so eventually fishless in 61 degree water I set a heading for those numbers.

Around 11 I switched the spread from purple and black feathers to zuchini clones. We were only running 4 rods due to the wind and difficulty keeping it all fishing properly.

Finally at about 12:00 we got a single, but turning back over that spot produced nothing. Around 12:30 I heard on the radio some big Farallon had just felt the weather had gotten bad enough to turn around and I was in Dad's little 21' Grady, and we were looking at a 3 hour run home at least.

At 12:45 I called it with one fish in the box and decided it was time to limp home with my tail between my legs. We pulled the rods and started heading east, and as I was trying to figure a comfortable speed and heading in the slop and chop I looked down at the sonar and the SST had shot up to 61.9 degrees. OK, put em back in! We didn't get all 4 rods back in when the short corner went off, my brother was in the process of dropping back and I think hooked a fish with the rod in his hands. We just kept turning back over that spot for 16 more tuna in singles, doubles a triple and a quad to finish in the next hour and a half. I was pulling my fish over the rail by the leader to gaff the others cause they weren't that big (12-15 lbs maybe). Too fun!

The numbers on that spot were 36.27 /122.44.
At 2:30 we decided we had enough fish for our needs so we left them biting. Tuna fishing. wow! back at the dock just after 6 pm. return the boat to my dad, eat a nice dinner my parents had prepared for us, back home in Sonoma County around midnight. longish day, brutally rough conditions, and I can't wait to do it all again when the calendar and the weather and the fish permit.

the catch minus 4 already packed in another cooler.

a visibly tired crew, but no longer sorry about the pounding I put them through!

me with the big fish of the day. boga on the water after we bled it said 27 lbs.

salmon season slow

2009-09-09T14:26:00.001-07:00

Back from my vacation (where I worked hard as a boat captain, and when lucky, fish processor) up in Trinidad, CA. What a beautiful place to tie up a boat. A great community. Right off the bat the Harbormaster saw me fueling at the Chevron and started helping me out, the mooring that they had for me wouldn't work but he had other ideas, etc. In the end I tied to a commercial boat's mooring who wasn't in the harbor at the time.

We got 2 fish on the opener, listened to the weather report the next day and stayed in and fished the klamath river for 4 fish, then got skunked on Monday, 2 fish Tuesday, skunked Weds, 1 fish Thursday outside the mouth of the Klamath, skunked on Friday.

Fishing was so slow, and I was outta gas, so I decided to pull the boat and go home a little early rather than gas it up and keep trying. Lots of work to do on the farm.
I sold 6 started pullets to a neighbor who just finished his chicken coop. I need to thin out my upper flock. I think one night when the door was left open there was some predation, I am down one cuckoo maran and no birds will roost by the door now, so they've taken to roosting in the next boxes which is annoying cause they poop there now.

I'm going to put up an electric fence around the turkeys so I can let them out of their tractor without fearing for my high-calcium hen feed.

its harder than I thought to produce food

2009-08-17T20:58:00.000-07:00

I used to serve systems administrators and network engineers as their manager for a series of Internet companies. I needed to spend more time with my new kids, and wanted to combine work with my passion for fishing. I was thinking most likely I'd try to become a sport charter captain. Then the Sacramento River winter run chinook salmon simply collapsed to 5% of its normal population. That was the fishery I had been concentrating on with my limited free time all those years.

During this time I read Omnivore's Dilemma, and I had the not very unique idea that I could probably produce food in this way that actually benefits the earth. Also I already knew in the back of my mind that industrial agriculture was killing the wild oceans (while fishing was getting the blame). Before "the book" I had unconsciously subscribed to the myth that producing food inherently equated to environmental degradation. I had an environmental science B.S. from a major university. I had the passion for interacting with animals and plants. I filled some of the gaps of my knowledge and experience by taking Sustainable Agriculture 110 (organic farming) and Agriculture 70 (Integrated Pest Management) at Santa Rosa Junior College and was very impressed with the quality of these classes. I never found out how to check what grades I got but I assume I did fine. I got some of the knowledge I was looking for was the important thing.

After that I just went ahead and planted a bunch of heirloom veggies, ordered a ton of chicks for future eggs and made a project plan of several batches of broilers, somewhere between 500-600 in total by the end of it I think. The chicken venture has been the more rewarding of the two, I had low introductory prices so I sold out completely with relative ease and my birds all turned out really well, sized between 3.5 - monster 6 lbers. In retrospect the low intro price was a mistake. Yet Sarah and I are still planning to charge less than the standard rate for pasture raised birds despite our highest in the state cost of living. I kind of see my competition as industrial organic, not other pastured chicken farmers. I've got my instincts guiding me as to how to build a market for real chicken.

The vegetables have been a real challenge to sell. The pasture fed eggs that started coming out in August sell easily, but I made some heritage mistakes in breed selection that caused me to get less than half what I expected. Right now I am only getting 2.5 - 3 doz/day though...

So I have another 100 chicks coming in October, and I have 20 turkeys in a mobile pen.

That is the story of Felton Acres so far. I am about producing local food with integrity, ideally benefitting at minimum not degrading the environment, and respect for the animals which will be incorporated into my family, friends, and customers. Am I the kind of person you would like to have producing the food you give to your children? I hope so.