Sharing our small farm stories and skills along our farming, gardening and homesteading journey. Visit the farm for an informative and sometimes irreverent tour through our garden, livestock pastures, chicken coop and greenhouse as we live - pasture to plate. Farming topics free range around pastured heritage pigs, broiler chickens and pastured eggs, heritage breed turkeys, an heirloom vegetable CSA and garden, high tunnel / hoop house / green houses, organic and traditional gardening, farm infrastructure, tractors, sustainable energy, permaculture, food preservation and even fence mending.

Farming stories and skills from our small farm, gardening and homesteading journey -

pasture to plate.

In this episode we discuss the crazy weather around the world and give our hopefull update on the AI situation with our gilt.

In the Coopcast Community we discuss a new tractor and what implemnts we reccomend for that tractor.  Frontend loader, tiller and rotarty mower come to the top of the list...  but that's not it.

In the Veggie Patch we circle back around to the Rowboat of Goodness from our listeners and list off some of the explicit varites we have selected.

Direct download: CoopCast_137.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 5:37pm EDT

This weeks episode shares our issues with a trio of cottontail rabbits that have been terrorizing our landscape and what we did to solve the issue.  We also complain about the snow and the cold on the farm.... because...  it feels good to complain.  We quickly throw in a mention of wood shavings and the chicken coop as well.

Then in the Veggie Patch we talk about some of the notable varieties of seeds that we purchased this year and where we got them from.
Finally in a the prototype hunting / fishing / land management / rural  lifestyle segment...  Farmer Andy talks a bit about a new part discovery that lets you move a scope and rings between different rifles a lot easier!
Direct download: CoopCast_136.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 6:30pm EDT

The updates this week are short as the cold weather has mostly kept the farming inside.  It's also hard to do much with over 3 feet (that's a meter for our international listeners) of snow on the ground.  We do take some time ot tell the story of Farmer Andy and his boxed wine tho!

In this episodes Farm U we talk about the hard and factual science behind vaccines and the debate about vaccination.  We look at the mechanisms of the immune system and the research behind the methodology.  Farmer Andy and Dr. Kelli have a round table discussion clarifying the real science of vaccines.

Finally we wind up on the front porch to share some of our closing opinions about the vaccine "debate" that's out there from our perspective.

Direct download: CoopCast_135.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 8:47pm EDT

This weeks updates include our struggles with a new gilt and artificial insemination this winter.  We also talk about the other challenges of the deep snow and our chickens.

We then look forward to warmer days in the Veggie Patch segment where we talk about the process we go through ordering seeds for the vegetable garden.  Who we have ordered seeds from before and what we look for in a seed company.

Direct download: CoopCast_134.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 6:53pm EDT

** There's one bad word - so for the kids ears this is marked "EXPLICIT" **

This weeks episode was a tough one as we talked about the loss of one of our first pigs ever - our favorite sow Hermione.  We talk about the stuff that led up to her passing and then how we managed things after she was gone.  That includes how our one lone pig Snow White is doing this winter.

Then we have some Ruminations about the farms online that don't share the lows of farming and only seem to like to share the positives.  We talk a bit about the following article - http://modernfarmer.com/2013/05/picture-imperfect-the-side-of-farming-you-wont-see-on-facebook/

Direct download: CoopCast_133.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 6:16pm EDT

In this episode we review the happenings on the farm (and gardens) over the last few weeks. We talk about the chickens finally starting to lay eggs again (and the impact of extending their days with lights). We talk about some of the food we ate and made of the holidays and we discuss the missed opportunity with artificial insemination and our pigs.  Andy complains about the cold weather and then warms up while telling a hunting store from last deer season.

Direct download: CoopCast_132.mp3
Category:farming podcast -- posted at: 7:36pm EDT