Being on pasture gives them the opportunity to forage- in fact about 40% of what a pastured turkey eats is grass!  And that’s why it doesn’t taste anything like the dry, pasty meat that needs a good smothering of gravy to be palatable.  Once you try our turkey, you will wonder why you only ever eat it about twice a year!  We barbecue turkeys all year long.  Nathan and I like to portion up the birds while they’re fresh, and freeze the breasts and thighs separately, so we can have it for sandwich meat, or an easy dinner whenever we want.  So consider getting a few!

Head to our pastured poultry page for ordering information. 

If you find chicken to be a little boring, a little dry, generally in need of sauce or seasoning, you will be blown away when you taste a ‘real’ chicken.  You will find that just a little salt and pepper is all you need to have the best chicken you have ever tasted.

Chicken is only available by pre-order, and costs $4.50/lb.  Send an email to greenbeingfarm@gmail.com  telling us how many you’d like.  There is a minimum 5 chicken order.  Chicken will be delivered to downtown locations in:

Guelph:  August 4th from 5-7

Toronto:  August 22 from 11:00-1:00.

At the farm any time after July 28th.

Exact details will be given when you order.

Have a closer look:

Ungrazed land

Result of rotational, multi-species grazing

The greening up of the fields is not only due to the manuring, it’s due to the fact that the action of animals on the soil can have the effect of increasing soil organic matter and sward diversity (said simply: the number of different types of grasses, legumes etc found in the pasture). On the ungrazed pasture, there is only the odd orchard grass plant, on the grazed field there are 2-3 different grasses, and clover as well. Both sections of the field were seeded and hayed in exactly the same way. This is an illustration of what ‘regenerative’ agriculture is all about…returning the soil to it’s natural, healthy state through smart and conscientious agricultural practices.  For more on regenerative agriculture, click here to read an article from the Rodale Institute.

On another note entirely, I have to share what I had for dinner last night.  Well, not share…it’s all gone.  But it was so good I took a picture:

Carrots, parsnip, celeriac, onion and turkey, all Green Being Grown....

...simmered in thyme and home-made turkey gravy and snuggled in under a cheddar-biscuit crust! Turkey Pot Pie anyone?

Of course, the reason I share this with you is to entice you to join our Winter CSA! This too could be yours by signing up…the best winter vegetables you can conceive of, all grown locally using organic methods. We have added a second, smaller share size…click here for more info!

While there’s not much outdoor farming going on over the winter, we kept busy educating ourselves and others.  Tarrah recently spoke at the Guelph Organic Conference, and the first ever Bring Food Home conference in Kitchener.

Our animals fared nicely over the winter as well. We winterized our hen house by applying an earthen plaster to the interior walls, making it draft proof, but also quite attractive!  Whether it was the warmth or the interior décor, they rewarded us by laying nicely all winter long. We keep a diversity of heritage breeds of hens that are adapted to our winter climates, and lay gorgeous eggs of different hues of brown, pale blue, grey-green.

Our sheep amazed us with their love of winter. Although we always offered the option of eating hay in the barn or out, they much preferred the great outdoors. We would find them outside after nightfall with an inch of snow on their backs not at all interested in coming inside. They grew thick, wooly coats, which they are now shedding. Yes, shedding! We raise Katahdins, a fairly rare, “hair breed” of sheep that actually shed their wool rather than require shearing. I will tell you more about them when we get closer to lambing season in May.

More photos of our heritage hens, and our sheep can be found on the winter edition of our Flickr page. And if you want to stay automatically updated on Green Being goings on, sign up to our RSS news feed.

What to do when your organic farm comes with a chlorine drinking, time sucking, energy hog of a swimming pool?

Fill it with carrots, of course!

This was the predicament  we faced when we moved to our farm about 2 years ago. To us, a swimming pool is a luxury we, and the environment, cannot really afford in this era.  But, with every problem,  an opportunity presents itself.  A swimming pool, when empty, is also a concrete foundation embedded in the earth.  What better place to store our vegetables?!

After consulting with Chris Vanderhout of Evolve Builders Group, our particular pool was deemed an ideal starting point for a root cellar, providing an insulated space for storage crops in the winter and reducing energy requirements drastically for cold storage of summer crops.  We could convert our pool into a root cellar at a fraction of the cost of a conventional cold storage unit, and run it using practically no energy.

With support from the Carrot Cache, a foundation that lends a hand to local organic farmers,we embarked on what we believe is the first ever swimming pool root cellar conversion!  The building uses rot resistant hemlock to cover the pool and give it lateral strength to resist caving in.  Additional insulation was sprayed inside and a door cut into the side of the pool, which is accessed by means of a ramp taking you below ground level. To increase the insulative value of the cellar, it will be under a living roof, looking like little more than a grassy hill when completed in the spring of 2010.

Best of all, we still have a place to cool off, and so do our carrots!