Our goal was to have a farm that worked with our natural environment. That meant choosing livestock, crops and methods that worked for our locale.

Sheep

Currently we’ve a flock of Rideau Arcott ewes that are covered by an Icelandic ram. This gives us thrifty easy lambing ewes that produce mostly twins. Our sheep do quite well on poorer pasture and have helped us reclaim and rejuventate the woodlot behind our house. Both of these breeds produce wonderful fleeces that we have spun into wool for our customers

Chickens

We started with hens just for eggs, now we raise most of our own replacement layers and enjoy the challenges of incubating the eggs! This also means that our hens have adapted well to our local climate.

Broilers

Like the big chicken producers in Ontario, we use a Cornish cross chicken for our broiler program. However, unlike the big producers, we allow our chickens to forage daily outside their enclosure. We also don’t “free feed” our broilers which allows the bird to grow the frame needed to carry the weight of the larger breast. We feel that this is a better and more humane way to raise these birds to their full potential.

Vegetables

As we began, we made an effort to choose the types of veggies we loved, but that would also thrive in our Northern climate. We’ve adapted our growing style to the weather by using cold frames, a greenhouse and terraces in our garden.

Field Crops

We’ve decided that in order to reduce our carbon footprint, we would be better off growing our feed rather than bring it in. This has given us the opportunity to grow our own oats, hay and fodder type crops. By trying different types of cereals, we hope to greatly reduce our off farm feed inputs.