Focus on Coop Suppliers:
Meet the New Meat Producers

by Suzanne Fisher

Honest Weight Food Coop has for many years sold naturally raised meat by individual order from Sapbush Hollow Farm, a cooperative of small farmers in the Cobleskill area. Now the Coop has expanded its offerings to include four family farms dedicated to raising freerange, pastured and/or totally grass-fed animals in the most environmentally friendly way they can. These farmers use humane treatment of animals and responsible conservation of farm land. By buying from them, shoppers bypass the morally questionable corporate mass marketing infrastructure of much of our food supply.

Dharma Lea Farm

Phyllis and Paul Van Amburg are the owners of Dharma Lea Farm in Root, north of Cobleskill. They have operated their 170-acre farm for two and half years, and lease another 200 acres for their beef cattle, pigs and laying chickens. Their beef cattle are entirely grass and hayfed and rotationally grazed. Their pigs dine on certified organic grain from Cold Springs Farms, a supplier of organic feeds and grains near Cobleskill. They also enjoy the untreated grass (“and dirt,” says Phyllis) and occasional organic vegetable scraps, raw milk and eggs. The chickens are also rotated onto pasture, a practice that controls for parasites and flies for the other animals, and are also fed organic grains.

The Van Amburgs typically harvest their beef cattle two at a time and their pigs two to six at a time. Although they use the services of Eric Shelley and his mobile meat processing unit for beef they kill at home, for Honest Weight they are required by law to use an USDAapproved facility for killing beef and pork. For this they use Nichols’ Meat in Altamont. Their eggs and pork are available at Honest Weight, with beef to begin later this year.

Elysian Field Farm

Debbie and Laurent Danthine of Elysian Field Farm in Canaan provide beef, pork and eggs for Honest Weight. They raise grass-fed cattle, giving them grain only when absolutely necessary. The cattle receive no vaccinations and are dewormed with an organic soap. The pigs receive certified organic grain in addition to grazing; but when they are put out to pasture, their grain needs go down by a third. This year the Danthines have been letting the sows farrow (give birth to piglets) on pasture. About 180 free range laying hens call Elysian Field home. They are fed organic feed at night when they return to the protection of their coop, after enjoying pasture all day.

The Danthines are now processing about five pigs a month, and also sell about 50 piglets a year. They process about two of the beef cattle a month as well, and keep about 24 cows. Elysian Field Farm also uses Jeff Nichols in Altamont for their processing. In addition to Honest Weight, they sell to several gourmet restaurants and independent customers. Beef, pork (including bacon) and eggs are all available now at Honest Weight.

Red Barn Farm

Grace Bishop of Red Barn Farm in Canaan provides pasture-raised lamb and chicken for Honest Weight on her farm in Columbia County. The ewes that give birth to the animals she processes for meat are fed some non-organic, entirely vegetable grain feed with crushed shells for calcium in addition to pasture, but the lambs eat only grass. The feed she purchases is provided by two other nearby farms who buy local, non-genetically modified (non-GMO) grain for grinding into feed. She keeps all the ewe lambs to grow her herd, and uses the rams for meat. Her sheep are pastured 12 months of the year using a two-week rotation and intensive grazing on 20 acres during the summer with movable, solar-powered fencing. The mixture of grasses has changed without planting and the soil has actually gained a half an inch from her management. During winter months, large round bales of hay near the door of the barn provide both a wind break and food for the sheep. The sheep are taken to Hilltown Butcher for processing, a facility that is willing to accept one or two sheep at a time.

Because Grace raises her own mix of meat and wool breeds, she is able to use the wool from her sheep. Every year after shearing she ships about 400 lbs. of wool to a processor on Prince Edward Island who uses 100-year-old equipment to make her wool into blankets. She gets 30 to 40 wool blankets to sell from her sheep every year. Grace parts from tradition in that she does not cull her ewes after they no longer produce young, but lets them live out their full life spans on the farm. This has created a need for her to find a way to dispose of the ewes when they die of old age. After experimenting with several methods, she is now using composting as a means of environmentally responsible disposal. This is an above-the-ground method using manure and old bedding that many organic farmers have turned to in recent years.

Although Grace has supplied Honest Weight with eggs from her farm, she is temporarily not supplying us eggs due to coyote and fox activity. Mary Ellen Holtzman works cooperatively with Grace to raise 1,000 meat chickens apiece per year. The chickens at Red Barn Farm arrive as chicks from Amish providers, and go out on grass their very first day on the farm in covered, bottomless pens with a broody hen to keep them warm. The pens are moved every day to provide a fresh source of grass and bugs, keep their pen clean, and to fertilize the pasture. They also receive a mix of vegetarian, locally grown grains. They live this way for ten to twelve weeks, then are processed on the farm in her own processing unit, so that the chickens never need to endure being hauled away for butchering. Because she processes in this manner, her chickens can only be sold by pre-order at Honest Weight. These Cornish Crosses come out as 4- or 5-lb. roasting chickens.

Grace is unique in this group of farmers because she does not now own her farm, but leases it. She was forced to sell Red Barn Farm while going through a divorce, but was able to lease back the land and continue raising sheep with some assistance from her children, 12-year-old Jacob and 10-year old Zoe.

Sweet Tree Farm

Sweet Tree Farm in Carlisle provides grass-fed beef and pork for Honest Weight. Owners Judy and Frank Johnson intensively graze livestock on 150 of their 200 acres. Judy pointed out that ruminant animals who feed entirely on grasses have increased Omega 3 fatty acids and reduced Omega 6 fatty acids. These figures are exactly the opposite for grain-fed animals. There are nutritionists who believe that grass-fed ruminants are also more digestible for people. She also pointed out that not only do we benefit from not having pesticides and chemical fertilizers dumped into our environment, we also are spared the expense and pollution from the fossil fuels used to farm corn for cattle feed. The pigs are fed certified organic grains in addition to the grasses, bugs and worms they find in the pastures. This year Sweet Tree Farm purchased piglets to raise, but next year they plan to raise only piglets born of their own sows on the farm. The animals are not vaccinated; but if they become ill, antibiotics may be administered.

All of the pork and beef that Judy and Frank sell to Honest Weight must be processed at a certified facility, so they send their pigs and beef cattle an hour away to Steiner’s Packing in Otsego. They send two or three of the cattle at a time and four or five of the pigs. The Johnsons use Eric Shelley’s mobile meat processing unit for customers who buy from their farm, so that those animals do not leave the farm while they are still alive.

Judy and Frank acquired their farm when they purchased half of one of the conventional dairy farms his family had owned. They consider themselves to be grass farmers — that is, their focus has been to rejuvenate the old hayfields and crop fields so that they would support the mixtures of grasses that perform the best in their location for their animals, creating a custom-fit sort of pasture. They installed a water system, did hand seeding of the fields and put in fencing, which was not completed until six years later.

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