Festivals and Animals

Well how about a taste of fall for you? Man, I feel like I must have missed an entire month or something. 59 degrees this morning when I woke up. I do not think we have seen the 50’s in months. Feels kind of good I must admit. And it got me thinking of beets, broccoli, and Lobo basketball. The joys of late fall for me.

On a different note, I have to thank you for all the great emails and support we got after last week’s newsletter about the new farm land and subsequent price increase. (If you have not read last week’s newsletter yet, it is still on the web site and I encourage the 4 minute read)

I got no hate mail. No one calling me a capitalistic pig. And no one spat on me for it. All in all, a pretty good week. Better than I had hoped. So thank you for your understanding on that.

On other news, the Harvest Festival is going to be changed this year. This October (the time for the harvest festival) is going to be really busy for the Inn at the Ranch. They are going to be expanding the rooms this winter and it will be a jumping place this October.

So we are going to try a little something different. A huge Weed n Feed party at the South Valley farm sometime to be determined in Oct.

Here is the idea. The farm down there is beautiful but rough. It use to be an active horse racing breeding/training center. But that was in the ‘80s and a lot has changed since the ‘80s. Shoot I have even cut my mullet that I sported in the ‘80s. Business up front, party in the back.

Sorry. Tangent. Back to the farm…so although it has so much potential, it needs a good amount of elbow grease to get back to its hay day. So we are planning a festival where you can come see the place and help us begin its transformation from horses to Organic produce.

We will take a Saturday, maybe the 25th, and be out there from 8 to 4, then if you would like to come lend a hand, just come on out. Kind of like the old school barn raising, but more like a new school barn clean up. We will provide food, refreshments, and plenty of gloves. You just need to bring the Advil and ice bags. Just kidding.

Besides the obvious goal of trying to get a huge jump on the progress of the farm, I am hoping that this will have another collateral benefit, building a relationship between the new farm land and you all. Like a first date or something.

My hope is that some of you will come back to the farm 5 years from now and say to yourself, “man, I remember when this looked like…and now look at it.” That is my hope at least. But it should be a fun day regardless. I will let you know more as we get closer to Oct.

That is one day of work. But I am afraid that we need a ton of work out there and also to move things off of our existing nursery. So I am looking for a general contractor to help us with many of our skilled projects. I figure in our 1,900 members, that we have got to have several contractors out there. So if you are one, or know a good one, please have them call me @ 681-4060.

What else...hmm. Beef and pork. Sorry vegetarians, ear muff it for me for just a second. We have got a bunch of fall beef and pork (both LPO and Kansas) coming into the warehouse this week. We have limited freezer space and it would help us a ton if you stock up your pantry now.

All the Kansas beef and pork is corn-free. Raised on transitional Organic pasture, with plenty of space to roam. Incredible stuff from a small family ranch in southwestern Kansas.

Please check out the shopping cart site www.lospoblanosorganics.net to order this meat. You will need to register one time if you are a first time user on there. The system will not recognize your user name from the CSA site.

Lastly, the vegan and vegetarian concern. I use to be a vegetarian for many years. My concern was not about health though. It was rooted in the treatment of the animals. I cannot stand the feedlot mentality. So I am thrilled that we can provide meat through the CSA that is raised the way animals should live. Not confined.

So I ask, actually beg, for your understanding on why we offer meat. I believe if you are going to eat meat, this is how it should be.

Have a great week, Farmer Monte