Agriculture
How far milk travels to get to the store — Quartz
The Agriculture Power 50 – City & State New York
When Is The Best Time To Start Your Agricultural Journey | Mara Fielder | Checkered Acres Farm
OFI 1155: When Is The Best Time To Start Your Agricultural Journey | Mara Fielder | Checkered Acres Farm
8/20/21
Web player: https://podcastaddict.com/episode/127372723
Episode: https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/offincome/Off_Farm_Income–Episode_1155_Mara_Fielder-071721.mp3?dest-id=215568
If you are seeking an agricultural/farming lifestyle, and you know it from a young age what is the best way to go about achieving it? One school of thought would suggest that you take a job, save your money and buy your farm when it is economically feasible for you to do so. This is what I did. I knew that I wanted to have my own farm when I was about 18 years old, and twenty years later my wife and I finally bought one. There is the other school of thought however, and that way of thinking about it says to get started right now and build slowly over time. My guest today, Mara Fielder, and her husband Brandon are subscribing to that school of thought, and they are thinking outside of the box to get this done. Mara and Brandon are currently leasing sixteen acres from Mara’s grandparents where they had been raising bees, boarding horses and providing riding lessons. However, a series of unexpected events derailed that process. Mara’s step-father is allergic to bees, and this led to some conflict in the family and the loss of the bee hives. Then Covid struck, and Mara lost her clients who were concerned about their horses being infected because she was still working in the community as a teacher. This kind of left Mara and Brandon back at square one, wondering how they would move to the next step. They didn’t allow this to get them down however. They are young, have energy and ideas and they are pushing forward. Currently they are living in town, looking for land that they can buy. In the meantime they have come up with an idea of a series of books for children that highlights the careers that a traditionally dominated by men but that women have found success in. The series is called “Girls Can Too” and they are in the process of being published right now. This original idea inspired a follow up idea of a book series profiling career choices normally dominated by women that men can succeed in. In this interview Mara and I speak about their goals, the setbacks they have already encountered and she and Brandon’s vision for the future. It is great to see the journey from this perspective and understand how they are planning to make this come true!
I am a big fan of the Off Farm Income podcast. I think he has a lot of insight on the rural and farming lifestyle and how to get there.
Bacon!
Bacon. I’ve avoided bacon over the past few years after an incident five or six years ago when a package of bacon got put in the wrong bag while shopping and didn’t get put in cooler and went rancid by the time I cooked it in the morning. I don’t know why I decided to try to cook it but I figured as a cured meat with the cooking process I would kill off any bacteria, but it still was gross. I was not sad to see the bacon in the plastic wrapper shrivel up and get burned that evening in the fire.
Since then I’ve avoided bacon like the plague. Bacon for a while was quite expensive and honestly despite the grease doesn’t have that much taste. Maybe if you raise your own heritage hogs on your land and make your own bacon like Cam Edwards but not so much the store bought stuff.
This past weekend I bought some bacon, made it up with eggs and also grilled cheese sandwiches. Came out pretty good. The grease also helped reseason my cast iron skillet which had gotten damp and had some rust. Honestly, I think I like bacon as an occasional treat.
Maybe eventually when I do own land and my off grid cabin, I’ll buy and raise a heritage hog like Cam Edwards does. Pigs are smelly dirty animals but who cares if you live in the country and have land. I’m sure I could put some very good bacon and the many pounds of lard to good use. Recycle my food waste into something quite profitable, keep it out of the burn barrel where it’s not going to burn very well. Composting is great but bacon is even better.
Beer Cans and Bison Skulls
Beer Cans and Bison Skulls 8/2/21
by Millennial Farmer
Web player: https://podcastaddict.com/episode/126566519
Beer Cans and Bison Skulls-Bison Ranchin’ in South Dakota with Scott Assman from Dakota Pure Bison. Join us as we explore the business of Bison/Buffalo Raching in South Dakota. PREMIUM BISON MEAT From Our Pasture to Your Door! Two South Dakota ranch families coming together to provide our customers with the highest quality bison meat. We want to make it easy for people everywhere to eat premium bison meat. What ensues is a politically incorrect podcast filled with genuinely improvised, authentic conversation, laughter and some newfound agriculture knowledge. Grab a cold beer and enjoy our moderately educational but extremely entertaining podcast “OFF THE HUSK” Millennial Farmer, Zach Johnson, is a 5th generation family farmer from West Central Minnesota. Zach actively promotes agriculture by sharing his day-to-day experience on the family farm. His vision is to build the connection between farmers and consumers. Zach’s mission is to become a national voice for agriculture, provide farmer to farmer education, and facilitate a collaborative conversation between farmers and the public.
I think over these two hours I learned a lot more about buffalo ranching, with a lot of humor. Maybe because Zach is my generation, but his humor and casual redneckness tickles me so much. This was a good program to kick back to next to campfire, drinking adult beverages as they were.
August 23, 1968 the Youth International Party nominates their candidate for President
Yes, Pigaus the Infamous was a Yorkshire, 🐷 which was and still is number one in the pork 🥩 industry although that's changing at least on small farms with the growth in popularity of the many heritage pigs that have unique characteristics like the ability to forage for a greater portion of their feed ration 🌾 or produce more lard and better tasting more fatty bacon 🥓.
Taken on Friday August 21, 2020 at Hogs.