Meat Inventory, Field Trip, The Best Way Forward...

Amy made it back from her girls weekend with her cup refilled. She was ready for a getaway. She came back recharged and ready to get back to it. 

It’s feeling like fall. Although it’s been perfect working weather, it felt like the majority of my work week was spent going in and out of freezers sorting inventory and filling orders. Yesterday we filled October beef shares. Earlier in the week we sorted through the chicken and filled chicken shares from October through the spring. Our pastured chicken production is seasonal, and though our chicken season won’t end for another couple weeks, we’re not harvesting anymore chickens for our farm. The chicken we have in our freezers now is all we’ll have until next spring. After filling chicken shares and orders, we’re already out of breasts, tenders, and wings.

We have 8 shelters filled with chickens left in the field that we’re raising for another farm. We spent an afternoon hauling empty shelters off to the side of the field, so we can let the cows graze that pasture later this fall. Instead of killing our own chickens this week, we helped the Davidson family harvest their chickens for 4D Farms. They’ve been helping us with our chickens all summer. In a couple weeks we’re going to process a batch of chickens for another farm. 

As we were finishing cleaning up after Wednesday’s killing, an Animal Science class from E&H came out to the farm for a field trip. I am blessed and grateful for the chance to have grown up on a farm. Even so, I was (and suppose I still am) disconnected from a lot of my food. Although only 1-2% of the population are farmers, 100% of the population eats food. Everyday. I’m sure a lot of those young men and women on the field trip have had very little farm exposure. We applaud Mrs. Thiers for bringing her class out to the farm to help bridge the gap of disconnect between society and food. I don’t know if they learned anything from visiting our circus of a farm or not, but hopefully they all saw that the food on real farms is not magically or mechanically manufactured. The food that we eat and depend on everyday begins with life and the stewardship of that life. This stewardship is not just the responsibility of the farmers. It’s the responsibility of all who eat food everyday. As long as we have a choice concerning what we eat, we are all responsible for the implications and consequences that come with it. 

After the field trip, we trimmed and seasoned Boston Butts and briskets to throw on the smoker. Amy pulled pork yesterday and vacuum sealed it. She also made a couple batches of chicken bone broth this week. 

I’ve been listening to a couple different audio books while farming lately, but nothing has been as notable as a podcast episode that a friend sent me early in the week. #75 of “The Shawn Ryan Show” with Nick Freitas (Woke Schooling, Identity Crisis, National Divorce and Parenting Advice). Before this, I had not heard of Shawn Ryan or Nick Freitas. Nick is a Virginia State Delegate. Usually, I don’t care much to listen to politicians, but I like what Nick had to say. In the four hour conversation, they dove into: public school systems, homeschooling, homesteading, community, family structure, freedom, inflation, immigration, and much more.

With our country having very divided views on the best way forward, almost all would agree that the way we’re headed is not good. The general feel is that there is more concern in regards to the direction of our country than optimism. So where is our country headed? In the last segment concerning the National Divorce, Shawn and Nick look ahead to some hypotheticals that could become realities if our current direction continues and escalades. 

Nick does not consider himself “a full-on homesteader… One of the reasons we got into homesteading, it’s not because my life long dream was to be a farmer… I never wanted to be in that situation (wondering), ‘Can I feed my family?’ And I wanted to take some control over that.” 

“Finding those communities of people with like-minded values and developing those core strengths and capabilities that make you more resilient and don’t make you as dependent upon the latest policy that comes out… Build those sort of communities that add resilience, that make you less dependent. Because the more dependent you are upon a government, which is perfectly willing to tell you what to do and try to micromanage and control your life… the less likely you’re going to be in a position to be able to resist if you really need to. And that doesn’t just apply to a government. It applies to an entertainment industry. It applies to a food supply industry…”

Talking about “a strong nuclear family” as the foundation for a strong society, Nick says, “They have every incentive to keep you in a perpetual state of dependence… Government policy has contributed to the destruction of the family in this country.”

“The part that I find so frustrating is that for the longest time, my genuine attitude has been: I think this is right, and I think this is wrong. But I also believe that you, as a free human being, provided you’re not infringing on the rights and liberties and property of other people, you can make different decisions. You can make decisions I don’t like. And I won’t interfere with your ability to do that. All I ask is that you don’t interfere with mine. That construct is what is under attack at this point.”

“Inflationary monetary policy is the most underhanded, pervasive, and quiet way that the government screws over its citizens.”

“So when they print a bunch of money, and both republicans and democrats have been guilty of this… When they print a bunch of money, the value of your individual dollar goes down… And that’s why prices go up…”

“Here’s the problem: politicians don’t get rewarded for cutting spending. They get rewarded for spending more. Until it collapses. And then they blame somebody else.”

“National unity is going to rest around the federal government doing very very few things… For everything else, you look to your state, you look to your locality, most importantly, look to the individual, as a free person to be able to make their own decisions. If we can get back to respecting that we’re not going to agree on everything, but the best way to live in peace is not to force everybody else to do what you want, but to sometimes just leave other people alone.”

“You’re free to live the way you want. The moment you try to impose that on me, you got something else coming.”

Have a good week.

Will