DS Family Farm
Worried about what you are "really" eating? Have peace of mind with pasture grazed meats.
Solar Powered Steer
Cows have been described as “starvation” animals. Meaning that about every waking moment they feel on the verge of starving to death. So their natural instinct is to eat like it might be their last meal. When they can’t eat anymore they rest and chew their cud. Then back to eating!
(Video: solar powered steer getting his ice cream just clipping tops of plants for sugar)
Like you and I, when given the choice, cows will eat the “ice cream” first. Ice cream to a cow is the best part of plants. The best part of a plant to eat depends on the individual cow. Either Energy or Protein. For the most part, our pastures have plenty of protein, so cattle are usually seeking energy when they graze. Energy is found in plant parts closest to the sun. Energy from ongoing or recent photosynthesis is a cows first choice, so they cream off the tops of plants first.
To sell beef we need cattle to get fat. Before an animal will get fat, their basic requirements to live must be met (energy). Most beef sold today is fattened on corn requiring large amounts of fossil fuel energy (see the link to NY Times Power Steer article). Here at DS Family Farm we use Solar Energy through the miracle of photosynthesis to fatten cattle.
Some folks have even said they can “taste the oil” in regular beef. I don’t know about that. What about the taste of corn? Personally I don’t know if anyone knows what corn tastes like these days. Corn is in everything, just look at the ingredient label. Everything tastes like corn and corn tastes like everything!
We urge you to TASTE the difference between an oil/corn powered steer versus a “solar powered steer”.
Animal Impact – reed canary grass example
Planned pasture grazing requires orchestrating cattle movement. Yep we think of our cattle moves like making music but we are really trying to get some desired effect applied to the land. Here is an animal impact example from this past spring. In an area invaded by reed canary grass our cattle were able to “open up” the land and allow broad leaf arrowhead (a native wetland plant) to express itself:
So what were the steps to make the above effect on the land? It began in March with a trail setup through this area to move cattle to stockpiled pasture on the other side of the wetland area.
When the trail fence was first setup, the wetland was frozen. Over the next week the wetland thawed and the animal impact started to appear. The cattle trailed through this area before “green up” for a couple of weeks. The area looks kind of nasty in the photo above.
With our continuous move pasture grazing system, we knew this area would “bounce” back in some altered state. Note in the trail photos above we have “open water” areas predominately in the trail. This open water provides a “habitat” as a result of cattle impact.
The red arrow in the photo above points to the location of the broad head arrow leaf plant photo at the top of this blog post. The photo below is a close up of reed canary grass next to the trailed area:
Wetland sites are very forgiving when it comes to trying animal impact scenarios. As we move to upland (drier) sites, animal impact becomes a little more scary. The main difference is planning the recovery time or how long we have before we can bring the cattle back to the area.
Take another look at the photos above. What was the difference in total production? Obviously the solid stand of reed canary grass produced higher forage levels. What was the benefit provided by the higher diversity of the affected area? From our observations, cattle enjoy diversity in their diet and wildlife prefer the diversity in habitat. Feel free to give us a call if you would like to stop by and see our cattle herd impacts… we are always happy to listen to other ideas!
2015 Grass-fed Beef Progress Report 2
Update on the grass-fed steers we will be providing you fall 2015 (Report 1). Remember our “grass-fed” beef is also known as “pasture grazed” beef. The term grass-fed is pretty well-known, but we also refer to our beef as “pasture grazed”. Why pasture grazed?
- Cattle pictured below have lived their entire lives on pasture, never confined to a feed lot.
- During the non growing season our cattle are on stockpiled pasture, never confined to dirt lots.
- Yes these cattle are 100% grass-fed, never fed corn, any other grain or grain by products.
- Our pastures contain diverse covers of grass, forbs, shrubs and trees.
- Cattle choose the diet they need, want or crave.
- Diversity is important, more than just “grass”-fed.
Pasture grazed beef steers offering fall of 2015 with photo of mother cow following each steer and the bull used (last photo):
WARNING – Flavor comes from two primary sources, diet and age of animal. These steers will be harvested the first of October, around 28 months of age. The flavor should be pronounced! The beef from these steers will have a flavor unique to our farm. Please contact us if you have any questions.
Not fearing fat
We promote eating healthy fats (pasture grazed animal fats) to improve ones health. A few examples: Oct. 2013 – Apr. 2014 CLA – Apr. 2014 Omega3s – May 2014 – Dec. 2014.
So would I take my our own advice when complaining about tight clothing from this past holiday carb season and deciding to loose a few pounds?
Before trying my turn at not fearing fat, I needed a system to track what was going on, how much fat was I consuming? Here at DS Family Farm we track different things in the pastures to monitor progress, but how would I watch my eating habits?
A coworker introduced me to myfitnesspal, a free cloud based fitness system to track diet, exercise and watch progress. To be honest, before starting this project I had no idea how many calories would be healthy or what my daily calorie intake was!
To begin, the recommended calorie intake for me ~2200 calories per day. What was my current intake? First four days of tracking:
At the start of my experiment, daily calorie intake was about 300 calories high, enlightening! Note the steady intake of first four days tracked. No reason to burn any stored body fat, a healthy dose of calories coming in daily. The wellness program I enrolled in to help me lose some weight was already warning me about FAT intake. The “FAT is bad” mantra was clear in my training. Ignoring the pleas to cut my FAT intake, I focused on overall calorie intake, take a look at the first 3 weeks (daily charts):
First three-week average was 2170 calories per day, not much variation and no weight loss. Steady day-to-day calorie intake is an excellent way to maintain your weight. The body has no reason to burn stored fat. My system anticipated a steady daily intake. Ignoring calls to cut FAT intake, it was time to shock my system. Have you ever tried a fast? Rather than reduce my intake to ZERO calories for a day, I liked the idea of just getting down to around 600 calories for a day or two (Dr. Mercola Intermittent Fast 5:2 Diet). Here is my attempt over the next 3 weeks to hit a day around 600 calories (daily chart): 
Two days per week around 600 calories, sounds too difficult and I am not ready to go there yet. My 6:1 Diet, 1 day per week around 600 calories isn’t too bad. Compare the two graphs above. End of first 3 weeks, no weight loss. End of next 3 weeks = 5 pound weight loss! My body was no longer able to expect that steady intake. Continue shocking the system, next 3 weeks (weeks 6 to 9 daily chart):
Weight loss for weeks six to nine = 5 pounds lost again (same as weeks 3 to 6 shown above). It appears varying my daily intake works to activate my body to burn stored fat. RESULTS in 20 lbs lost over 4 months.
Did I attempt to lower my FAT intake? No. To my surprise, my weekly average percent Fat intake was steady around 25% (Fat Grams/Total Grams). I would like to try to increase percent healthy fat intake in the future. Here are weekly average charts for the first four months (charts shown above were daily):
Recommendations to limit FAT gram intake to around 40 grams per day were ignored. I did make an effort to eat only Omega 3 type fats and when possible, from pasture grazed animals. Fearing carbs, omega 6 fat (vegetable oils), processed foods along with a shock to the system now and then seems to work. Now can this diet be maintained?
Concerning exercise, my activity level has been fairly constant. Very little sitting around watching TV. Walking and daily pasture moves keep me active!
Bringing Back The Pollinators!
What are you doing to help pollinating creatures big and small? At DS Family Farm we celebrated “Pollinator Week” by setting aside a large patch of Milkweed! In the photo below our cattle herd is moving through this paddock on daily moves. When they reach this section of the paddock, we have installed an extra temporary poly wire fence to prevent the cattle from grazing off this patch of milkweed. At any one time, most of our pastures are ungrazed using daily moves, so we have milkweed protected across the farm. Since herd moves were coming up to this milkweed area during Pollinator Week, we made the extra effort to keep the cattle out.
Our cows desire milkweed for some reason that we don’t understand. Maybe it is nutrition or maybe the plant aids in digestion, some other reason? Diversity in their diet is important and rarely do we consider any of the vegetation growing in our pastures as “weeds”. So why keep the cows from our largest patch of milkweed? Monarch butterflies, are in need of conservation and require milkweed to complete their reproductive cycle. Within the past two weeks we have observed about 20 Monarch butterflies during our paddock moves. How does this compare to past years? Unfortunately this is not something we have tracked in the past but plan to record our observations into the future.
For a good source on pollinator conservation, check out the Xerces Society. Following is a list ideas to help protect pollinators, things we try to do here in our pastures:
- Increasing the availability of milkweed seed to help create monarch butterfly habitat;
- Would you like to come harvest milkweed seed at DS Family Farm?
- Work with farmers to create pesticide-free, flower-rich habitat on farms;
- DS Family Farm has taken the “Bring Back The Pollinators” pledge.
- Assisting in the search for rare native bumble bees;
- We identify native bumble bee nests and protect them from disturbance.
So go ahead, take the challenge to Bring Back The Pollinators!
Healthy Diet
Review of this blog’s past posts will show “Diet” is one of the main topics. My failing health brought me to the realization that things had to change. Finding out pasture raised animal products were a key part of a healthy diet was a fantastic fit, animal agriculture has always been a passion of mine.
This past January I whined a about my weight swing up after the Christmas Carbohydrate Season. A month or so after that post my health insurance company sent a notice that I could take an online health checkup. Guess what, based on my responses to the survey I was overweight. This surprised me a little. Turns out that a 6′ 0″ male of my age should weigh 185 pounds, not 199 pounds. 
The good news, I could enroll in an online Virtual Lifestyle Management – VLM (TM) course to help me lose weight. So I signed up and in the future will share the experience of taking my advice from earlier posts while completing the VLM course. As you may imagine, the online course makes the point to avoid fat! Fat has more calories per gram and VLM recommends a diet that has no more than 25% of calories from fat. How do you think I took this advice based on my earlier posts???
What about you? Where are you on your quest for a healthy diet? Who’s path have you crossed on your venture?
On my journey towards a healthy diet I have had the privilege to make acquaintance with Danna Seevers, a local “busy mom with 5 kids navigating her family’s way on the ‘Health-Nut Highway’.” Check out her Good Life Naturally blog. A good post to start with is “The ‘Diet’ Mentality” which sums up our cultures fixation on diets and the irony of it. Danna is well known in her community for healthy eating and has given talks at local schools. Check out this Prezi presentation posted on the local Concordia University website: Health-Nut Highway. (The Prezi thing is just cool and Danna’s information is great!).
So what Exit are you on?
(Photo credit: http://www.morguefile.com/)
2015 First Calf
It is that time of year. The time of year that all Cow-Calf producers work for year round, calving time. We are happy to share the 2015 first calf photos below.
Please share any comments on our Facebook page and feel free to stop by during the next few weeks as more of these little guys show up on the farm.
Pasture Grazed vs Grassfed Beef
We use the terms “Pasture Grazed” and “Grassfed” to describe our cattle operation. So what’s the difference?
The term grassfed (grass fed, grass-fed) refers to animals that are raised entirely without grain as part of their diet. Cattle are ruminants (have four stomachs) for digestion of vegetation. Prior to World War II, most cattle in the USA were grassfed. Following World War II, with surplus corn production, cattle were moved into feedlots and fed corn. Today, the term grassfed identifies cattle raised without being fed corn or other grain sources. Our cattle definitely meet the definition of “grassfed”. But grassfed really only defines the “diet” of the animal as being without grain. It does not define HOW the animal obtains its diet. An animal maybe “grassfed” and live a part of its life in a feedlot being fed a non-grain diet such as hay and silage.
When we describe out cattle as “pasture grazed” we are describing the animal’s diet as grassfed AND our cattle spend their entire life on pasture! We do not have any permanent confinement areas or dirt feedlots. Our animals spend 365 days per year in our pasture grazing for their diet. We do feed hay during part of the year but the hay is fed on the pasture. This helps improve our soil and grass, keeping the nutrients cycling as mother nature intended (not piled up in a feedlot).
Do we just turn the cattle out to pasture and leave them there?
- Absolutely not. Turning cattle into a pasture un-managed would be harmful. The soil and grass would be depleted along with the health of the cattle.
- We manage grazing in nature’s image. Imagine how our native prairies developed. Roaming herds of bison grazed moving all the time based on season, fire, predators, humans and other influences.
- We generally move our cattle daily to a “fresh” paddock.
- We use portable electric wire to keep the herd close together as predators would have influenced bison (see above photo).
- Unlike bison, our herd can only “roam” our property which requires us to offer minerals not found on our farm. Bison would have roamed large areas reaching unique “mineral licks” over their annual migration. Refer to our “Healthy Cows Eat Dirt” blog post.
Hopefully this gives you an overview of our pasture grazing operation. Please contact us if you would like to see our pasture grazed cattle in motion!
Weaning calves
Weaning time can be stressful for cow, calf and cowboy. Traditionally, weaning calves meant to separate the cows and calves by distance. For example the herd was brought into a corral where calves would be separated from the cows. The cows would then be sent out to pasture and leave the calves in a lot or ship the calves off to a pasture elsewhere. The traditional process was stressful due to the handling and separation of calves from momma.
During our first year of weaning calves we tried a technique called fence line weaning. Where we physically separated the cow and calves but placed them along a fence to remain near each other. The cow and calf could still see and touch each other but the fence made nursing impossible.
We were happy with the low stress results of fence line weaning our 2013 born calves last spring. The drawback to this system, you end up with two herds to move. In the photo above we simply moved both herds along the fence line toward the camera position. We kept the cows and calves in the two herds for about 40 days before combining them back into a single herd. When calves returned to their mothers, a couple of calves tried to nurse but were quickly kicked away by the cow. When the cows had their 2014 calves and the new calves started nursing, we had one cow that allowed her 2013 fence line weaned yearling to start nursing her again. This was unacceptable as the new calf would not be getting enough milk and nutrition. At that point we installed a weaning ring into the nose of the yearling to prevent it from stealing milk from its younger sibling.
As an alternative, this year we are trying weaning rings in all 2014 calves. This did force us to bring the calves into our coral and run them through the catch gate to insert the rings. It is a fairly easy process and the calves did not seem to annoyed. Here is a 20 second video of Jacob inserting a weaning ring:
The result is a single herd with some temporarily frustrated calves that can no longer figure out how to nurse. The rings in their nose prevent normal sucking. Both the fence line and nose ring methods are fairly low stress on cows, calves and cowboy. The weaning ring requires a little more labor up front but will save us time and hassle by allowing us to keep moving just one herd rather than two. Plus we can leave the rings in long enough to make sure no new calves are having their milk stolen by their older sibling.
Weaning Weight
We will be weaning calves later this week. Our grassfed cows work year round, but we do give the cows about two months off from providing milk to a calf. The last calf crop was born mid-May 2014 and the calves have had momma’s milk for the past 10 months. This allows adequate time for the calf rumen (special stomach for grass digesting) to become fully developed. The calf is now ready to turn grass into nutrition and ultimately beef for the rest of its life. Actually the amount of milk the cow has provided daily has probably dropped significantly over the past few months. Yet the calf has been getting a nice dose of that all important drink to keep the calf growing through this important time of life.
This photo is our smallest cow letting her calf suck just the other day. We are not trying to wean heavy calves so we can brag about weaning weight. I wish we did have a scale to weigh our animals but we just are not a big operation at this point. From the looks of it, this cow, which probably weighs 950 lbs. will be weaning a calf that I estimate at 575 lbs. or greater. She has accomplished raising this calf on an all grass diet of stockpiled forage with supplemental hay. Lets take a look at the percentage of weight that the cow was able to wean. Weaning a 575 lbs. calf / 950 lbs. cow = 60% of the cows weight weaned in the calf. Not all of our cows are this small, but I think it is safe to say that most of our cows will wean a calf around 50% of her own weight. Of course they will do it on an all forage diet.
Please contact us if you would like to visit the herd.
