Monday, February 29, 2016

Is It Spring?


     This past weekend brought some pretty wonderful weather for the end of February. We just got back from the 2016 MOSES (Midwest Organic & Sustainable Education Service) Conference, and I remember attending some conferences where we weren't quite sure if we would make it to the conference because of winter road conditions.
     The conference was very informational, and we got to re-connect with some old friends. The last workshop of the conference that we attended was titled "Protecting What We Have All Built Together", presented by Mark Kastel of The Cornucopia Institute. The Cornucopia Institute is a watchdog research group that advocates for small family farms and keeps a big watch on the giant organic farms that seem to slip through the organic requirements. One sentence I took with me from this workshop that Mark said is "our CSA customers and farm market customers are dedicated to the small family farm, they will go out of their way to shop directly with the farmer when the farmer has their food available, when it may be more convenient and less expensive to shop the big organic products offered at Walmart." We feel very fortunate that we have such great support in our community, our thanks goes to you!
     Other workshops covered improved grazing for poultry, pigs and cattle. We continually strive to have healthy pastures available for our livestock. There is still a need for more information on goat grazing, and I am hoping there will be a workshop on that subject at the next MOSES Conference.
     Our does (mother goats) are ready to kid any day now. We have over 30 does this year, so we are anticipating over 60 goat kids. The first milk will go to the kids, but once we have a majority of the does done with kidding, we have enough milk to start our cheesemaking for the season. Our cow had her last milking on February 28. She gets to rest and get ready to calve in May.
     Dreamfarm has Cheese Shares available for the 2016 season. Check out our website www.dreamfarm.biz for more information on the shares we have available. There is an on-line sign-up to make ordering easy. We hope you will join us for the season, we look forward to providing our farmstead organic cheeses.
     Happy Spring!