Raw Milk Monday

Please note: If you are new to my blog you can catch up on the reasons for my raw milk passion and the struggles our own farm have experienced, by reading any of the previous posts on the topic I have written over the last 4 years . To do so, simply enter "Raw Milk" in the search bar, on the right.


Its' certainly been awhile since I've updated everyone about the raw milk status in Illinois. So here goes.

You might recall, the last meeting of the Dairy Work Group, a subcommittee of the Food Safety Committee of the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) was held in November 2013. A couple weeks later Molly Lamp of IDPH emailed the members of the Dairy Work Group, of which I was one, telling us the group was no longer needed.

Our comments and suggestions were now on their way up the chain of law making command. After a year of hard work, heated discussions and banging our heads against the brick walls put up by those who were far more interested in the welfare of big Ag than they were in the ability of small farmers to make a living selling a wholesome product.

Last week I was contacted by  Eva Voinigescu  a reporter with the Medill News Service in Chicago. She's working on a video story about raw milk policy in Illinois. Like a good reporter ( a rarity today with so many just re posting and re tweeting without ever verifying their sources) she called Molly Lamb for a comment.

Ms. Lamb told her that the group was NOT disbanded.

How very interesting is that since we've not had another meeting nor have any been scheduled for 2014.?  Ms. Lamb told us herself the proposed rules suggested by the group, and hopefully all the documented opposition to those rules, was making its way towards the Joint Commission of Administrative Rules (JCAR) .But once again I am not surprised. If I learned anything last year in the trenches of law making it was this:

Facts are not valued in the process. Opinion, power and end results for those who will benefit most, are on the other hand, greatly valued.

For your viewing pleasure I've recopied the shortened flow chart of the rule making process for raw milk sales in Illinois. Once again I have to state that we in Illinois were very fortunate that we found out about the changes being suggested BEFORE they went to JCAR and at least had the opportunity to oppose then and suggest more reasonable solutions. Whether or not our work made any difference still remains to be seen. But we were proud to at least be part of the process.

Bottom line as of today February 10, 2014. There are NO enforceable rules regarding raw milk production or sale in Illinois.

Winds of Change

Being in our 50's we understand the facts of life. Teenagers hate you. Produce goes rotten before the cookies do and it snows in Illinois in the winter.

But THIS winter had been over the top. Snow then freeze then thaw then rain then snow and freeze and thaw and sleet and more snow topped with a nice frosting of ice.

99% of the time the wind will come from the south east and the majority of shelters take this into account.

Which means even with bad winds our animals have good dry places to get out of the wind. Except when the wind shifts, like it has been lately and blows in through the open north sides of the barn.

Leaving us and them with indoor precipitation. Drifts in the barn etc...

We are so tired of this winter!

Ashland grows Up and Up and Up

You might recall this little guy. The dark one in the back.

 

 

 

He was about 4 months old when the pics above and below were taken.

 

 

I snatched him last year while making a delivery in Chicago, on Ashland Avenue thus the name. I am sorry to say I bought him from a pet shop instead of a shelter but he probably would've ended up in a shelter so what's the difference? Well the main difference was he was one sick puppy. Parasites to the max. losing weight, vet visits and his first two weeks here were rough. Then he got better. And bigger and bigger.

 

He is still growing.

Rumored to be 3/4 German Shepard and 1/4 Huskie, he was the first dog in the history of our farm to ever be allowed inside. Because he was so sick it just had to be. So he was house trained. And he does tricks! Like sit. Who knew dogs could follow commands? We do enjoy his company in the farmhouse.  Except when he insists on lying in front of the sink just because there is a heat register right there.

Sometimes he's inside and sometimes he is out. He tolerates the cold and the heat equally well. Sometimes he chases the pigs while other times he obsesses over the ducks. Chases them but never actually has them for dinner.

 

 

Since he came to the farm after Fannie, our Great Pyrenees,  he is at the bottom of the doggie totem pole. When I come out of the house Fannie will not allow him anywhere near me until SHE decides it is time. She eats first and gets the best spots in the barn to sleep in.

But he gets joy from other things

Like chasing snow.

 

Must be the Husky in him. I'm wondering if its too soon to hook up a sled behind him?  

Feeder, breeder, sucker, eater What's the difference?

You might look at this guys and think...

Pig. Just a pig.

But really he is so much more. He might be a suckling pig still nursing, fat and round and oh so yummy. Sold while still hanging with his family they are oft used for parties. Folks like to roast them whole with head and feet in place so their guests know it's a pig and not a camel they are having at Aunt Bertha's 93rd birthday fest. Roasting pits can be dug directly in the ground or made out of a pile of bricks. They sell for $6.75/pd

Or maybe when he is closer to 8-10 weeks and after weaned from mama, able to enjoy grub all by himself, we might sell him as a  Feeder. Feeder pigs are very popular on the new homesteads. people buy a few, raise them to around 6 month of age and take them on a field trip (no stopping at McDonald's but maybe Bob Evans) to a locker who slaughters and packages the meat. Enough for your own family and maybe some friends. A great way to start raising hogs without having to do chores in the winter. Buy in spring, sell in fall, have ham at Christmas. They sell for $125 each

After the age of 10 months , if large enough, our Red Wattle hogs might be used as breeders. We used to register our young stock, based on the traits of their parents, as breeding stock, but now we wait. We have 3 year old gilts just now having their first litters (thus turning them into sows) and I'm sure I'll probably only register 1 of the 3. She'll be the prettiest one, with the long lashes and the wide hips. They sell for $300 each if young and up to $1200 each if they are a bred sow or proven boar.

Eaters are those hogs we save for our won freezer and for the store freezer. Like the ones we sell to customers they are 6-8 months when they go to the locker. When they come back they are in in nice neat vacuum packed see-through packages with all the appropriate labels. It is the most expensive way we sell our meat. Mostly because of all the packaging and labeling. Each vacuum pack is 40 cents each. Each label with our farm name is 12 cents. Plus more for the organic seal and weighing of the packages.

Pretty is never cheap.

Thus the meat in our store is sold by the pound. Bacon would be $10.49 a pound compared to paying just $ 4.65 pound ($3.75 a pound plus processing) if you bought an entire hog. So now you know why going "Whole Hog" is a good thing.

Farm Diversification ...In Reverse

We got our dairy license in 1995 and sold to a co-op.

We raised a few pigs and calves each summer for freezer meat for a few friends and family

Then we became certified organic and sold more meat out of our basement freezer.

Then we stopped selling milk to the co-op and sold only to folks who came to the farm.

Soon after we started selling to a Chicago Grocery Store

Then another and then two more

Then we sold our meat at the local Farmers Market

Then we started selling to restaurants. First one, then two then ten.

After that we opened up our farm store

Then we sold roaster hogs to folks who liked parties and we delivered all over the state

Then our Red Wattle meat got picked for chef contests and school events and fund raising and and and and

And we were very successful

And totally exhausted.

So we put our farm business up for sale. While we wait for Prince Farming to come along and sign on the dotted lines we have taken up a new direction.

We call it, reverse diversification

First we cut back on roaster hog deliveries and then we eliminated the restaurants. We started resigning from the boards we served on and all the other events.

We stopped entering our pigs in beauty contests!

Last week we stopped selling to grocery stores.

As of  yesterday 100% of all our pork, and milk and beef) will now be sold direct to the consumer who comes to our farm, ONLY and we are very excited but of course worried.  When we ceased selling to restaurants, we prayed our customer base would be strong enough to purchase our meat directly or in the grocery stores.

And now we are pulling away from the grocery stores. Again we have to ask, "what if our customer base is not large enough to support what we are raising?" or "what if there are enough customer numbers but not enough consumer cash to afford our organic meat?" or "what if we have enough customers, who have enough cash but don't want to drive out to our farm?"

What if?

What if?

What if?

What if  we do manage to sell enough meat just out of our own farm store to actually pay the mortgage and the feed bill and the phone bill?

We won't know until we try.

Our customers tell us they would buy more meat if we had it available; that they have friends who would buy our meat if we had enough. That they would like to pre-order a whole beef and a whole hog every year.

So OK we'll give it a try. Instead of spreading ourselves so thin we'll spread ourselves thick.

About 1 &1/2 inch thick for 7.75/pound if you happen to be a bone-in pork chop in our farm store.

Prodical Blogger Returneth

And I'm back!

Did you miss me? I sure missed you. I had trouble concentrating, couldn't sleep, couldn't eat, couldn't compose operas. One day I even picked up the phone to call you but was afraid some other new blogger you were following would answer. How awkward would that have been? Breaking up-even temporarily-is hard to do. So glad we're back together.

But still..What a fabulous blog-cation. I am refreshed and recycled. Good as new. While I resisted the urge to blog and to read other blogs I did play around with the looks and layout of my blog. I even added pages at the top and dropped in several hundred different backgrounds before deciding on ...green.

And my novel? The whole reason for taking time off from blogging? It is done and query letters are on their way to prospective agents. What have I done?!?! Want to follow along with that drama? Check out my writing specific blog over there...to your right.

                                                             

Subtle Hint

I highly recommend the same type of vacation for all of you. Not that your blogs are stale or anything but mine sure was, worse than day old donuts out of a dumpster.

I should know. I've had my share.

So what else did I do with this time off?  In addition to my novel, and the O'Shaughnessy Writes blog I started TWO more blogs. Some women crochet, cook or run for office. I like to blog. The others are about my family genealogy and about material belongings. Both will serve as foundations for two other books I will self publish for my kids. I'll make them public later on. Since Blogger is still free, seemed like a great place to dump a large amount of data and photographs.

And just makes it that much easier for our government to snoop into my personal life. Because you know how interesting I am to them.

So how about some farm updates you ask ? There have been a few. They are in order of frustration.

1. Farm Sale. Our interested party is no longer interested. Yes, after four long months of conversations, financial sharing, employee training and business projections...he decided it was best for him not to invest in a farm at this time. We found out last week. BUT...from ashes come...dirty hair or something like that. Anyway another couple is interested and working to secure financing.
We remain hopeful. We're idiots that way.

2. January was a terrible month weather wise. The extreme cold proved too much for three of our older calves and we lost all of them in one night even though they had good bedding and adequate housing, At 5 months of age you don't expect such sudden deaths but then again this has been our worst winter in decades. We also lost a few piglets and a couple chickens. The farmers themselves, outside of several falls on the ice...persevere.

3. We discontinued our wholesale agreements with the four grocery stores we served. After 5 years of deliveries and meat juggling (do we sell the burger to Chicago ?, Peoria ? or keep it for next weeks lasagna? They were disappointed but understood. Even though we so enjoyed seeing our name in the grocery store aisles, we feel great relief and now our customers who come direct to our farm will have more meat to choose from. Sort of a Lose-Win-Win scenario.

4. After several years of fighting the good fight regarding raw milk regulations in Illinois, I resigned from the self-appointed leadership position of the raw milk farmers.  At the end of November IDPH pulled the plug on our group and told us Thanks for All Your Work but We Really Don't Need you Anymore. Now the proposed rules go up the chain of command. So it is  a good time for us to let another farmer or consumer lead the fight. We will continue to sell raw milk off of our farm until they drag us off.

I'm a big girl so hopefully they will go after the lightweight farmers first.

5. We continue to dream about The Poor Farm, see the specific page above that I've dedicated to this topic, but the new home plans are on hold now that the farm did not sell. In the meantime we use the 7 acres for target practice.


Enough updates for now. I have things to do...like get back on all YOUR blogs and see what trouble you've been stirring up.

Stop Peeking

HEY! What are doing? I told you I'm taking a break and I meant it. That new header (additional photos, deletion of photos, change in blog width, possible addition of an instagram video) is just a figment of your imagination and may not even be there when you come back February 1 like I told you to. Now go on...get outta here.