It all started with an experiment at our kitchen table six years ago. We had read that 100% grass fed beef was better for our health than grain-finished beef, that there were “good” fats and “bad” fats, and that the ratios of these fats to each other was also important. The old saying: “You are what you eat” should apply to cattle as well as us, right? So, we tried a simple experiment that would end up changing our lives forever.

My fingers are purple tonight. We just came back from picking blackberries at the base of the Blue Mountains. It was a great Sunday afternoon and I enjoyed spending it with my family. We have four children between the ages of 5 and 11 who have gotten much better at helping us fill the containers! We do this every August, just before the local county fair. “Our place” is on private property that my uncle rents for summer pasture. I have spent many days in that pasture, chasing cows down the long ridges and out of the brush in the bottoms during fall round up on my saddle horse, Peaches. Mostly I enjoyed these times, but I haven’t gone the past year or so. We all get so busy with our own plans and life fills in the gaps…

During this period of withdrawal and rehabilitation, weeds grew. The soil lashed out. It got ugly. I reasoned “Why grow something and make nothing when I can grow nothing and make nothing.” Later, someone asked, “What are you growing?” I said, “Dirt,” which, as it turned out came to be true. The question for me became, “How can I make these natural and historically abundant plant nutrients available to the chemically dependent soil once again?” I had to rethink my farming practices.