Heritage Lane Farm

Trip to get pigs

2011-01-02T21:57:00.000-08:00

We had a chance to buy another large black sow from our friend Dave Dalan in Walla Walla, WA. Dave was nice enough to pick up our orginal breeding pair about 18 months ago and when we found out he was downsizing we decided to buy another sow and 7 weaned piglets. The timing was great as we had decided to spend Thanksgiving with Kelly's family in Walla Walla. We were worried a bit about weather which turned out to be the least of our problems when we ended up blowing out a tire just 25 miles out of Walla Walla on our way home. To make a long story short and with a lot of help after 4 hours in the cold we were on our way. With 3 trips in the winter including this trip, one to Montana for sheep and one to South Dakota to get our Mulefoot pigs we feel very blessed to only have had a flat tire.

Busy Summer and Fall

2011-01-02T21:22:00.000-08:00

With such a busy summer and fall we neglected the blog, with the new year we hope to stay on top of posting more to keep those that follow up to date. This posting with summarize what we been up too lately.

Spring was quite a challenge in 2010 while we had planned ahead and started most of our seeds indoors we lost most of them to a cold and very wet spring. We were not alone and found that even many of that veg table growers that participate in the Bellingham Farmers market had to replant. We were able to do well with lettuce, peas, cabbage, spring and winter squash, corn and bean but never enough to sell. We had lots of requests for tomatoes but only harvested a couple handfuls but with the addition of our green houses we were picking tomatoes until Nov just before Thanksgiving when we had a very hard freeze. We are hoping that with the greenhouses and starting seeds again indoors we will do better. Each year we hope to do better as we learn more about growing and harvesting in the Pacific Northwest.

Busy Weekend

2010-04-17T19:42:00.001-07:00

The last couple of weeks have been pretty hectic trying to get a couple of projects completed. I few weeks ago I started a chicken coop inside of our barn. We need a place for Kaden to keep his bantam chickens for the fair and wanted a winter home for some laying hens that we could then build an outdoor access area for them. It took a little while, but finally this evening we moved the chickens into their new home. Our Buckeye chicks are almost two weeks old and they are now occupying the big area in the coop. I will get a picture as soon as I can. Their wings are almost in and they are already looking much bigger.

We finally gave up on our initial attempt at a portable hoophouse because the wind kept knocking it done. We finally decided to build some permanent structures and spend a little more and do it right. So far I have pretty much completed 2 hoop houses, 1 is 9'X24' and the other is 11'X24', I have to enclose one end still and eventually will enclose the other end and put it a door so they can be sealed off, although they will work for right now. We used 2" PVC pipe and attached them to 2"X4"'s so they would be secure and then put on greenhouse plastic and attached that with lath strips so the plastic cannot go anywhere. Again, I will get pictures shortly. I want to build at least 1 more and may add 2 more at some point. I am also just starting to build some small 4'X8' hoophouses that are more portable. I am using my PVC pipe from our failed hoophouse so it does not go to waste.

I also got our electric fence installed in our field over the last 2 days. I was hoping to do a daily rotation of the animals, but at the moment that is not going to be feasible. I realized that you have to clear a strip for the fence because our grass is about 3 feet high at the moment and I have to weed eat a border and then put up the fence, it would take forever to do every day so I am going to move them every week or 2 depending on how quickly they eat the grass. Right now the grass is so high that they get lost in there, but the good news is they have lots of great food to eat.

Baby Chicks

2010-04-08T21:12:00.000-07:00

Our first batch of Buckeye Chickens arrived on Wednesday. We ordered 25, they sent 26 and 4 did not survive the trip so we have 22 chicks on our make shift brooder. I am currently building a chicken coop in the barn and we will move them into that when it is done in a few days.

Those darn varmints

2010-03-27T11:51:00.000-07:00

I mentioned previously that we got our first goose egg. I went out there the next day and it was gone. I could not figure out what had happened and exchanged emails with the person we got the geese from originally. They thought it might be a rat or something like that, but we do not really have any rats around here. They then did not lay any eggs until yesterday they built a nice nest, of course in a place where it should not have been. I moved the egg into their section of the barn where they spend the night. Kelly went out this morning to milk the goat and there was a possum roaming around not far from the goose egg. Let's just say there is now one less possum in the world. Our goose laid another egg this morning and hopefully we do not have to worry about varmints getting hold of them.

Hoop Houses

2010-03-22T11:51:00.001-07:00

I spent considerable time over the last few weeks trying to get hoop houses up so we can get a head start on vegetables. To buy a production hoop house is a lot of money, which we do not have at the moment, so the exercise has been to try to create one that works for a minimal investment. Last summer we built 2 of them over the tomatoes for a couple of weeks to try to increase the heat available for them to grow. During August, however, the wind is not as big a factor and they did fine last year, but not during March. Our hoop houses are 25 feet long and about 11 feet wide. I used PVC pipe which I spaced at 5 foot intervals and then have a spine going down the middle with 2 pipes extending out every five feet. The end of the PVC pipe is placed over a 2 ft rebar stake that we have in the ground to provide support. We then put plastic over the top to trap the heat. At first I used some bricks to secure the plastic, but that did not work so I moved to cement blocks. That helped a little bit, but a strong wind still blew down the structure. The third attempt was creating a wind barrier at the south facing opening and that again helped a little, but not enough and it all came down again. The fourth attempt, which finally has worked, is taking another concrete block and tying the PVC pipe on the south opening to the concrete block so the wind cannot lift up the structure. I also built a bigger wind barrier to the south of both of our hoop houses to deflect the wind away from the structure. Next time around I am going to face the structures east/west instead of north/south and see if that helps as well. We have 2 hoop houses up and just need to by some more PVC pipe to create a third structure. The cost of this hoop house is about $50, plus the cost of the plastic, which is far cheaper than getting a commercial hoop house.

Good days and bad days on the farm

2010-03-18T10:13:00.000-07:00

One of the lessons that we have learned is there is a lot of good days and maybe a few more bad days on the farm. This morning I went out to the barn to feed the animals only to find our first goose egg of the season. I was wondering when they would start laying eggs as nothing much had happened so far. She had built a nice nest in the feed tray that I was using to feed them grass. I then went to feed the goats, only to find our twin baby goats had died during the night. I am not sure exactly what happened, but I think the other goat that we had in the pen may have sat on them. This was particularly traumatic for us, especially for Kaden who breaks down in tears every time an animal dies. It has certainly taken the fun out of the day. If there is any bright spot in all of it we got the goats for their milk and we still get that. I was not really sure what we were going to do with the kids anyways. Fortunately we have one more goat that should have her kid soon and this time we will separate them and get the kids out of the pen sooner. We were going to do it today, but unfortunately, it ended up being one day too late. We also separate our Oxford ewe from her twin lambs, which is always difficult for both parties. It is sad to hear them out there just bawling away trying to find each other. It has been eight weeks and it is time to wean them.

Slow Foods at Heritage Lane Farm

2010-03-11T10:17:00.000-08:00

Slow food was introduced in Italy in the 1980’s as a reaction to the trend toward fast food. The thought was that food has important societal values and the trend to fast food was negating the benefits, as well as being unhealthy. Here at Heritage Lane Farm we consider the slow food principles to be an important part of our efforts to educate people on the changes that have come to the food system over the last few decades. One of the important things the U.S. Slow Food organization has done is to establish an Ark of Taste that identifies important food that is being lost with the commercialization of the food system. The Ark of Taste includes a wide variety of fruits and vegetables, livestock, poultry, and prepared foods like bread, cheese and drinks. The items on the Ark of Taste have important historical significance in the U.S. food system and it is just as important to protect as historical buildings and sites.

Heritage Lane Farm uses the Ark of Taste as one of the determinations as to whether we have a vegetable or livestock on our farm. Although not everything that we have is on the Ark of Taste, we intentionally have a number of animals and vegetables on the list. From a livestock standpoint, our Navajo-Churro sheep and Mulefoot Pigs are both part of the Ark of Taste. This year we will also have Buckeye and Delaware chickens, as well as Narragansett turkeys, all of which are part of the Ark of Taste. We also have a number of vegetables on the Ark of Taste list including Amish Deer Tongue lettuce, Lima Cisco Bird Egg and Hidatsa Shield dried beans, Green Mountain potatoes, and Cherokee Purple tomatoes.

Our long term strategy of having an outdoor kitchen and commercial kitchen where we can host local chefs and events is also part of the slow food strategy. By being able to experience food within a few feet of where it was raised provides a wonderful opportunity to experience food the way it was meant to be.

To us slow food means more than just eating a local meal. The commercialization of many livestock breeds has meant that many breeds have intentional been genetically bred to grow as quickly as possible on the least amount of high protein food. This has had adverse impact on the temperament of the animals, as well as the taste. Our breeds of livestock grew more slowly and have not been genetically bred for certain traits. Our sheep and pigs will take almost year to reach maturity, instead of 5-7 months like most commercial breeds. Our chickens take 10-12 weeks before we butcher them, instead of 8 weeks for the commercial breeds. To us, slow food is more about how an animal is raised then it is just about the preparation of a meal. We would rather have livestock with a personality then genetics to pack on weight as fast as possible. By the way, if you ever doubt the benefits of slow food, just give our food a try and you will be able to taste the difference.

2010-03-05T19:21:00.000-08:00

Over the past two weeks we have added two sets of twin lambs, the one mentioned last week was born a week ago on Thursday and then we added another set of twins yesterday morning. For some reason, Thursday mornings are the days for twin lambs as all three of our sets of twins were born in the middle of the night on a Thursday, my most busy day of the week. I barely have time to get them situated in the morning before leaving for school and not getting done until after 6pm in the evening. So far we have managed well and outside of some minor issues our 2010 lambing season is a great success.

Lambing Season

2010-02-28T18:31:00.000-08:00

A little over a month ago we added twin Oxfords to our farms, both of which are getting big and getting close to being weaned from their mother. Over the last 10 days we have added 4 Navajo-Churro lambs to our flock. We had two singles and then one of our ewes had twins. So far the 4 lambs are adjusting well and already starting to get big. We have one more Navajo-Churro ewe that should have her lamb in the next week or so and then we have another Navajo-Churro and a Southdown ewe that will not have their lambs until April or May. As usual, all of the lambs are coming in the middle of the night because when I go out in the morning to feed the sheep all the sudden there is a new lamb running around.

The Navajo-Churro that had twins caused some interesting moments for me. It was last Thursday and I have to leave for work early so I was hurrying to get all of the feeding done. I saw the ewe that based on her size I really thought that she would have twins. I fed them and she had one lamb with her and I looked around to see if there was another lamb, but did not see anything (although it was 6am and dark in parts of the barn). I was a little dejected that she only had a single lamb and went on to feed the other sheep and pigs in another part of the barn. While feeding them I heard a baah baah like a lamb was looking for its mother. I went back to the other part of the barn and finally found the twin in the corner. He is a very dark brown, almost black, and in the dark I could not see him. I hurried and separate the ewe and her two lambs into another pen that we had so she could adjust to having twins and I can give her a little more food. I took a few pictures of the twins, but they did not turn out so I will have to try again tomorrow.

2010 Planting

2010-02-15T19:04:00.000-08:00

The 2010 planting season is starting early as we already have lettuce, cabbage and spinach starts growing in our living room. In the end we will have about 90 different varieties of vegetables growing over the next 10 months or so. Today we got a couple of hoop houses ready so we can put the lettuce out in a few weeks and then will follow that up with tomatoes, peppers and melons. Our hoop houses are pretty simple, just PVC pipe that is attached to the ground with a 2 foot metal rod that is stuck in the ground(we will put up pictures in a few weeks). We experimented last year with the hoop houses, but they were too long and we had the PVC pipes at 10 foot lengths which was too large of a gap. This year we are doing 25 foot hoop houses and we have PVC pipes every 5 feet to provide more structure. We also glued the PVC pipes together this year so we did not have the pipes coming out like we did last year.

Most of our vegetables come from Baker Creek Heirloom and Seed Saver's Exchange. Both specialize in unique varieties of vegetables. Potatoes we had to get from other sources because the potatoes we got last year were not available this year. We also are getting some corn and soybeans from a couple of Seed Saver members as we wanted a blue corn for flour and neither Baker Creek or Seed Saver's have a blue corn variety available. We will highlight some of the vegetables we grow as we go through the year. It will be an exciting year as we are off to a much early start and we learned a lot last year that we will apply this year.

2010-01-25T18:55:00.000-08:00

The Oxford breed comes from Oxfordshire, England and was developed in the 1830s through the crossing of Hampshires and Cotswolds. The resulting sheep combined the hardiness, muscling and wool quality of the Cotswold with the carcass quality and grazing ability of the Hampshire.

Oxford is the largest of the English “down” breeds, developed for the lush pastures on the hills, or downs, of southern England. They are related to the Southdown sheep that we have in that both are "down" breeds from England. Oxford sheep were imported into North America in the late 1840s.

We got our Oxford ewe from a farm in Gig Harbor, WA a few months ago, but are just now getting around to posting a picture. We unexpectedly had our first lambs of the season on last Thursday with the birth of a ewe and ram. The ram was very small and weak to start with so we have been feeding it ourselves and hoping that it gains strength quickly so it can manage on its own. It is almost like the ram lamb is about a week or two behind in its development when compared to his sister. The lambs are a very cute gray color with very long legs.

The primary reason for getting the Oxford is for our two boys and the fair. The Oxford ewe and the ewe lamb will be their primary show animal in the Northwest Washington Fair in August. The size and conformity will make it tough to beat in the show ring. The Oxfords are very large (we named her Twice My Size), but very easy to work with and not nearly as jumpy as our other sheep.

2009-12-25T17:51:00.000-08:00

The origin of the Mulefoot is unclear. The breed is most likely to have descended from the Spanish hogs brought to the Americas beginning in the 1500s. It shares some attributes with the Choctaw hog, and the two breeds likely come from the same ancestral stock, which was loosely selected and managed until the late 1800s. In the early 1900s there were two Mulefoot breed associations and over 200 herds registering purebred stock. As of a few years ago their were less than 200 registered Mulefoots and most Mulefoots can be traced back to the Holliday family in Missouri. A few years ago Arie MacFarland in South Dakota bought the Holliday herd of Mulefoots and has continued the tradition of providing breeding stock and restoring the Mulefoots to their prominence. Arie runs an impressive outfit about 20 miles north of Sioux Falls, SD. She has most of the foundation stocks for Mulefoots and Guinea Hogs in the United States. She manages as many as 200 pigs on her farm of 80 acres. She also meticulously manages the genetics to provide as much diversity as possible. She has done an amazing job.

Last Friday I left to make the 2000 mile drive to Dell Rapids, South Dakota to pick up our new herd of Mulefoots from Arie MacFarland. We purchased 3 mature sows and a junior boar from Arie, as well as 5 young pigs that we will raise for butchering in the summer. Five days later and after many hours on the road I arrived home with the newest addition to our farm. Mulefoot hogs are the only pig on the Slow Food Ark of Taste list because of their origin in the U.S. They do not get as large as the Large Blacks that we already have, but will be a nice complement to the Large Blacks. Whereas the Large Blacks are leaner and longer, the Mulefoots will have a bit more fat and bigger hams.

Mulefoots are unique for a couple of reasons, the first is as their name implies, they have a mule foot instead of a cloven hoof that all other pigs have. Second, as you can see in the pictures, they have longer, thicker hair that in some Mulefoots is fairly straight and in others is more curly. They are taller, fatter, and shorter than the Large Blacks and are jet black in color versus a dull black of the Large Blacks.

Mulefoots have a similar disposition as the Large Blacks, both are very docile and easy to handle. They eat primarily eat grass and hay, with a little grain each day to supplement their diet and the occasional pumpkin. We look forward to introducing this amazing pig to Whatcom County.

The middle picture above provides a nice contrast between the Mulefoots and Large Blacks. The three pigs in the upper right hand corner of the picture our are litter of 3 Large Blacks. The pigs in the left hand side of the picture are the Mulefoot pigs. You can see the noticeable difference in hair and color.

2009-11-09T19:21:00.000-08:00

The Oberhasli goat is a dairy breed developed in Switzerland in the mountains around Bern and Freiburg. Oberhasli goats were first came to the United States in the early 1900s. Goats are generally brown, but can range from light tan to deep reddish brown and have black stripes down there back, on their belly, and their face. Oberhasli goats milk is the most similar to cows milk and one of the reasons that we got this breed, on top of the fact that it is about the only real dairy breed on the American Livestock Breeding Conservancy list.

Our goats came from Edelweiss Acres in Olympia, Washington. They use Oberhasli goats primarily has pack goats because of their disposition. We have two females, both of which are pregnant and expecting sometime at the end of February. We will use the milk for our own use, both to drink and to make cheese. We will get a pasteurizer sometime around the time they have their kids. This is not really a money making effort for us, but something that we thought would be fun to try, especially making cheese. We have made cheese before but it is more difficult using store bought milk that has been homogenized.

We currently have our goats with our two Southdown sheep and we got an Oxford sheep that I will talk about in our next post. The 5 animals are still trying to adjust and the Southdown sheep our exhibiting their shyness and keeping their distance from their new pen mates.

The Three Sisters

2009-11-01T13:56:00.000-08:00

The Iroquois Indians used to plant corn, beans and squash together as companion crops. They each provide nutrients that can be utilized by the others and each draws out different nutrients from the soil. The pole beans utilize the corn stalks to grow and the squash plants help keep down weeds between rows. We ran our own experiment this last year with mixed results. We planted corn like you normally would with about 10 rows of corn and then planted the beans next to the corn and the squash between the rows. This created a couple of problems. One it was very difficult getting around as the space between corn stalks was all taken (and then some) by the squash so harvesting was difficult. I am also not sure the beans got enough sunlight, or at least for some reason we did not get great yields on the beans, although we did on the corn. The other problem I realized is that we planted summer squash in the corn as well which was very difficult to find and we had some get too large before we realized they were there.

Next year we will do things a little bit different, firstly we will plant summer squash separately to easy the harvest of zucchini and other summer squash. We will also plant the corn and beans in squares or circles and leave 3-4 feet between the squares and plant squash in the rows so there is more room to get around. We will plant the beans along the outside 1 or 2 rows to make sure they have adequate sunlight and so we can track their progress more easily. We were able to get a good harvest in a relatively small space, next year we hope to do even better.

1 Week

2009-10-18T19:19:00.000-07:00

Our piglets are one week old today and the weather was a little warmer and less rainy so we took them out for a little while this afternoon so they could enjoy the sun. They are getting much bigger and starting to venture around their pen a little more. For the first few days the stayed close to the heat lamp and where Guinevere would sleep. Over the last two days they have started to wander a bit more and tonight was the first time they were over in the food area with their mother.

We are having troubles getting our Mulefoots at the moment. We had someone going that direction that agreed to pick them up, but they ended up sick before they got there and ultimately had to turn around and come home so our Mulefoots are still sitting in Dell Rapids waiting for plan b. Either we will find someone else buying pigs from them coming in this direction or worst case is Kelly and I will drive out there in March between quarters at WWU and pick them up then.

The New Piglets Have Arrived

2009-10-11T19:44:00.000-07:00

After a very sleepless night, we have our first litter of pigs from Guinevere. Our first litter was 3 piglets, which is a little smaller than we had hoped, but we are also glad to have the first one out of the way. Normally a large black can have a litter of 10-12, although their first litter is always smaller. So far the mom and three piglets are doing well and we should be fine as long as the mom does not lay on one of the piglets, which almost happened once while we were out there. We will provide more updates and pictures over the next few days.

It is going to be a busy couple of weeks for Heritage Lane Farm as we are adding a number of new animals in the next 2 weeks. Our Oberhasli goats are ready to be picked up and we will do that as soon as the opportunity arises. We are also getting some Mulefoot Hogs from South Dakota which should arrive in about 10 days if everything goes as planned. This will pretty much get us to full capacity, except for maybe another sheep or two and then adding poultry next spring.

Harvest Dinner

2009-10-04T19:33:00.000-07:00

Recently we invited a few friends over for dinner and made a meal almost entirely from the harvest from our farm. It was an enjoyable evening and the food was delightful. We had:

Leg of Lamb
Roast potatoes and squash (we used Rose Finn Apple French Fingerling and Purple Peruvian potatoes and Musquee de Provence and Blue Hubbard Squash)
Cucumber Salad (using Lemon and White Wonder cucumbers)
Sweet Corn (we had Hopi Purple which is one of the rare purple colored sweet corn)
Heritage Pumpkin Pie (using a mixture of pumpkin, Musquee de Provence and Blue Hubbard Squash)

It was a very simple meal and did not take much time to cook, but well worth the effort. Our long-term goal is to be able to do these types of events on a bigger and broader scale, but it was a delicious test run.

Whatcom County Farm Tour

2009-09-22T13:59:00.000-07:00

We had the opportunity this year to participate in the Whatcom County Farm Tour sponsored by Sustainable Connections. I have to admit I was a little nervous because this is our first year and I was wondering if we would really have that much to tell versus some other, more established farms, that were on the tour as well. We did a couple of displays, one on rare breed animals and the other on heirloom vegetables, which are the focus of our farm. I then conducted a 20+/- minute tour and talked about the different animals that we have, a little bit about their history and why we chose them over more commercial breeds. I also talked a little bit about heirloom vegetables and some of the experiments that we were running this year. I am not exactly sure how many people visited the farm, but it was somewhere in the 400-500 range. By the end of the day I was exhausted and a little horse from talking for 8 straight hours, but based on the feedback we were glad that we did it and hope to have the opportunity to do it again in the future.

I want to offer a special note of thanks to Sustainable Connections for giving us the opportunity to participate. They do amazing work for local agriculture and I look forward to working with them again in the future to promote local farms.

Toulouse Geese

2009-09-15T09:03:00.000-07:00

The Toulouse Goose was originated near Toulouse, France. It is a large goose that weighs about 20 pounds. The grey colored breed has been recorded as far back as the 1500’s. Toulouse geese are fairly mellow and work well on small farms, but not with other more aggressive breeds of geese. They do not need a pond, although they will swim if given the opportunity. They geese also do not fly and will stay close to home, partly driven by the non-aggressive nature of the breed. Toulouse geese have been in the United States for at least 200 years and are also considered a colonial breed, having been part of the colonial farms in the 1700’s.

We got our 2 geese from the same place we got our Southdown Sheep. Gary Fisher at Camelot Downs Farm in Whidbey Island specializes in colonial breeds and has sheep and a number of types of fowl. We hopefully have a male and female and will have goslings next spring, but it is difficult to sex geese so it may be 2 years before we have goslings.

Southdown Sheep

2009-08-31T15:19:00.001-07:00

The Southdown was developed in southeastern England in Sussex. The region has a mild climate, fertile soil, and good grass that make it excellent for raising sheep.

The Southdown originated from the native sheep of the region, which were improved beginning in the late 1700s and continuing through the 1830s. Southdown sheep were known as hardy and quick growing, and the quality of their meat was celebrated. The sheep are white with mouse colored faces. They have wool on their faces, ears, and legs. Both ewes and rams do not have any horns.

Our Southdown sheep come by way of Gary Fisher at Camelot Downs in Whidbey Island. Dr. Fisher is one of the foremost experts on colonial breeds. Colonial breeds are those that were present in Colonial times around the time of the U.S. Revolutionary War. Although there is not agreement when the first Southdown sheep came to America, it looks as if it was in the 1600’s.

We decided on Southdown sheep for a couple of reason. First, Southdown’s are primarily a meat sheep and grow more quickly and bigger than the Navajo-Churro. There wool is not as plentiful as the Navajo-Churro, but it is much softer and can be used for clothing, where the Navajo-Churro are used primarily for rugs. The second reason is for our children’s 4-H projects. Showing sheep in 4-H is much easier if you have a meat breed and Southdown’s are the rarest sheep that will do well in competition.

Navajo-Churro Sheep

2009-08-28T09:11:00.000-07:00

The Churro sheep were brought from Spain in 1540 and became the first domestic sheep in America. By the 1800’s the Navajo-Churro sheep had become extremely popular in the Southwestern United States, especially amongst the Hispanic and Native American populations. The sheep were valued for both their meat the fleece, which soon became an important part of the textile production.

The United States government destroyed almost all of the Navajo-Churro sheep in the 1860s in at attempt to control the Native American Indians. By the 1930s there were very few purebred Navajo-Churros remaining. A professor from Utah State University began a program on 1977 to restore the Navajo-Churro sheep to the prominence. Over the last thirty years, the breed has grown from just a small flock to a few thousand sheep and although still considered threatened according to the American Livestock Breeding Conservancy, they are making gains in populations.

In the 1860s, the Navajo-Churro sheep population was nearly destroyed as part of the United States government’s efforts to subjugate the Navajo people. Churro stock was further diluted by continuing efforts to "improve" Native American flocks through introduction of other breeds. The government’s attempts to control rangeland erosion led to further slaughter of -Native American flocks. By the mid-1930s, very few "purebred" Navajo-Churros remained, and they were scattered across the Southwest.

Both ewes and rams may be polled or have two or four horns. Mature rams average 160–200 pounds and mature ewes about 100–120 pounds. The breed is noted for prolificacy. Lambs are easily born and vigorous, and the ewes are excellent mothers. The weaning rate is high, especially given the environment. Navajo-Churros have a double-coated fleece that weighs four to six pounds. The fine, soft inner coat provides insulation, and the long, coarse outer coat protects the inner coat from dust and dirt while repelling rain and snow. The fleece is low in grease, which makes it easy to process. Navajo-Churro sheep are found in several colors, including white, silver, blue, brown, red, black, and spotted. Patterns such as badger face are common. This range of hues is valued by wool crafters and sheep breeders alike. The wool of the Navajo-Churro is primarily considered a carpet wool and it is often used for rug weaving. Navajo-Churro sheep are part of the Ark of Taste sponsored by Slow Foods, USA, which is another reason that we wanted this breed.

Our flock was purchased from a farm in Montana who had purchased them from a breeder in the tri-cities. We started with 5 ewes, 3 rams and 2 whethers and since had 1 of our ewes die, which we replaced with a ewe from a farm in Monroe. We also have used to the sheep for our own food supply. This year we had 6 lambs and we will be selling those for meat later this year once they get close to 100 pounds.

What Are Rare Breed Livestock

2009-08-23T16:11:00.000-07:00

Many years ago a number of different breeds of livestock existed throughout the world. With the commercialization of livestock, breeders selected a small number of breeds that met their economic needs and production practices. These breeds were then bred to achieve specific traits and soon after every other breed began to disappear. This left a number of livestock breeds that had been around for hundreds of years close to extinction. Over the last few decades, organizations like the American Livestock Breeding Conservancy began working to restore these rare breeds and bring them back from the brink of extinction.

Unfortunately, the traits that worked for commercial farms are not well suited to small farmers who shun commercial practices. These rare breeds of livestock have valuable traits and we wanted to highlight the benefits of these breeds, and that is one of the primary reasons for starting Heritage Lane Farms.

We started with Large Black Pigs, which is an English breed that originated in Cornwall, Devon, and Somerset in southwestern England. This breed was popular until the 1920's when it fell out of favor to more commercially accepted breeds like Yorkshire and Hampshire, which grow more quickly and are easily adaptable to confinement operations. By the 1960's Large Blacks were almost extinct, and even now they remain on the critical list of the American Livestock Breeding Conservancy with only a few hundred breeding pigs in the world. Our pigs came from Texas and there is only one other farm in Washington that we are aware of that raise Large Blacks.

Large Blacks are pasture raised and eat primarily grass, with only a small amount of grain (whereas commercial breeds eat a diet entirely of grain). Large Blacks grow more slowly and can take as long as a year to reach a weight where they can be butchered. The upside is that they are leaner and have a texture and taste that is very different from pork you buy in the store. The other upside is the Large Blacks are less aggressive (they act more like a family dog than a pig) and the boars are not aggressive and can remain with the piglets and sow. The downside of the commercial breeds and production practices is that boars are very aggressive and must be separated from the sow and litter at all times.

We currently have one boar (Lancelot) and one guilt (Guinevere) and our first litter of pigs is expected at the end of September. Both were born in May 2008 at a farm in Texas. They will be bred twice a year and each litter will have about 10 piglets, although the first litter will likely be smaller than that.

It was somewhat of a miracle that we were able to get them as there is a very short list of Large Black breeders and every one that I had contacted was sold out. Last October we contact Cathy Cox at Oleo Acres farm in Leonard Texas who happened to have a guilt and a boar left and it just happened that a person from Walla Walla was driving down in early November to pick up a number of pigs, so ours went along for the ride. At $300 a piece they are much more expensive then finding a local pig on Craigslist, but they have been well worth the extra money.

The Large Blacks were the unofficial start of Heritage Lane Farms and since then we have added Navajo-Churro Sheep and will soon be adding additional breeds of sheep, pigs, and poultry. Each of these will be highlighted in future posts as we work to educate the community on the benefits of rare breed livestock.

Why Heritage Lane Farm

2009-08-07T20:28:00.000-07:00

For a number of years Kelly and I have talked about having a small farm that would teach our children valuable life skills. When we lived in Portland we took initial steps to get a lavender farm, but through unforeseen events we ended up moving to Lynden and putting our dreams on hold. For many years we waited for the right time and opportunity before we finally were able to fulfill our dreams. We still have a number of obstacles that will need to be worked through, but we have at least gotten started, although not as gracefully as we would have liked.

As we thought about what we were passionate about one thing we came back to was unique breeds of livestock and heirloom vegetables. We bought a few chickens and turkeys when we moved to Lynden 5 years ago (we still have a few of the chickens left) and learned a lot about animals and fencing. Last year, two of our children participated in 4-H and raised lambs for the fair. We learned about raising sheep and enjoyed the challenges and new opportunities to learn.

Farming is tough work and it is competitive. There are a lot of small and large farms competing for customers and we had to find a way to stand out and try to provide a unique product. I have always done things a bit differently from the crowd (not many people would run for county council after only leaving in a community for a year)and focusing on rare breed livestock that only a few people (or in some cases no one) has in the area seemed like a good way to stand out from the crowd. This also provides us an opportunity to educate people and make a difference. Hopefully the things we grow and raise will be less rare in coming years, but in the meantime it has been educating, challenging and fun all at the same time.

Our other passion is for local food and having some measure of self-reliance. We wanted to raise food that we will eat and enjoy and hopefully have enough left over for others to enjoy along with us. I have my own concerns about the food supply and commercial production of food. I will skip the long editorial, but suffice it to say I do not want to be overly reliant on farmers in other parts of the country or world for a critical item like food. I am a strong advocate for local businesses and especially local food. I would just as soon not participate in corporate agriculture, where feasible, as I have ethical and economic concerns about their business model. My test for the farm is that if commercial agriculture is doing it then I do not want to, and if commercial agriculture is not doing it then it is worth investigating further.

In the end, it become obvious that heirloom vegetables and rare breed animals were something that we could get passionate about for a number of reasons. We are sharing our story as we learn and hopefully encourage others to think outside of the food box. We are not farmers in the traditional sense and we certainly have less knowledge about farming then other people, but we are also not tied down to certain ways of doing things and are willing to try something new. Welcome to Heritage Lane Farm, and welcome to what food was meant to be.