Weather warms, Spring is near…
Chickens are working overtime in the egg factory. Overalls and gloves are discarded for shorts and spring sunburns. Fishing poles are dug...
Sheep Milk in Abundance
We’ve been milking sheep for almost 5 years and for the first time—we have a lot of sheep milk!! It’s fun and a little overwhelming....
Making Animal Rennet 2/6/2025
Rennet notes January 2025 Harvested abosunum from a Brahma bull calf 10 days old. Washed, salted, treated like a casing. Dried by the...
Mozzarella!!
Simple Fast Meltable Stretchy Delicious Recipe below ⬇️ ⬇️⬇️ I began making Gouda 17 years ago, hard cheese has always been fairly...
Tell me again why Grassfed Genetics are necessary?
Tell me again why I need grassfed genetics to make my dairy cows perform without grain?? Dairy cows need calories. They honestly don’t...
Folks, Learn to use a halter.
This is at least as important as learning to milk. Buy a simple rope halter, or two, they’re cheap, usually under $10 at any TSC or feed...
Dairy Sheep. Sheep Dairy. Lamb, lamb, lamb.
Molly bought her first dairy sheep 4 years ago. Mollarella was an amazing, no history, Craigslist find, productive ewe! She’d lamb...
Second summer of a Grassfed Dairy—much improved!
We’ve celebrated the 4th of July and are officially plunk in the middle of Ozark summer. Days in the 90-100, nights 70-80. Blah!!! But!...
A misfit post
We made 30lbs of cheese, 30 pounds of butter, as I’m carrying our 13th child. I am neither a martyr or a saint, I am not oppressed, I am...
Raising Kids and Heifers
Heifers are an open slate, no past of kicking, no history of mastitis, no calving difficulties, no known production. What I love about...
Reflections of a Grain Free Dairy
It’s been over a year now since we switched the milking herd to no grain. Overall I can’t complain. The cows have stayed fat enough...
Tips for Bottle Calf Success
Calf Raising Wether you’re starting you’re entire herd from bottle calves or just raising the occasional calf, there’s a few things we’ve...
Brown Cheese, Mysost, Brunost
Is it really a cheese? Or do we just call it that because Carmelized Whey With Cream takes too long to say? If you’ve ever made cheese,...
January 15
Day 2 of A Very Cold January. The snow stopped early this morning leaving us with 5-6" of un-meltable powder. The warmest temp today was...
Walnut Syrup Making!!
So, several years ago a new friend introduced us into Black Walnut Syrup. It was AMAZING!! They had made several gallons on their farm in...
Grassfed Dairy…is still fed
It’s math—calories eaten need to be equal or greater than calories burned to maintain condition. Environment is 60% of performance....
3 Days…how to train your cow.
That’s the average of how long it takes to teach an adult dairy cow to walk on the halter. Walk well enough that I, at eight months...
Are you ready for a milk cow?
Are you? Will you ever be truly “ready”? Do you enjoy cows? What are your resources? Infrastructure? Children? Spouse? Beef cattle?...