Freedom Reign Farm

Fresh organic Honey Sourdough is out of the oven and will be out in the shop at 11am after it has cooled! BLTs anyone??? 😋🍞🥪🥓

Thinking about getting into goats? There are so many ways to go about it, from pet-only status, to brush control pets, to raising for meat and dairy... I believe there's something for everyone. If you're considering adding goats to your property and would like a little guidance, reach out to me.
I will give you my honest-best sage advice, in an encouraging yet not pushy way, even if that means advising you not to get goats. Haha. We will have a number of goat kids available in July, with several more ready for new homes this Fall. If I don't have something you're looking for, I will help you find animals that help fill your dreams and your needs!
📸 2025 of Miss Peach (Delaney's daughter) due to give birth on the 19th of June! Love this girl.

Well, it happened. I finally made someone on the internet mad. 🤷‍♀️
If you've been following us for a while, I hope it's abundantly evident that we love and care deeply for our animals.

This person obviously doesn't know me or how we run our farm, so I'm really not that upset about his/her comment. But it does make me wonder. How can you see one post, one reel, one blip on the internet, and think you have the whole picture? 🤔

Honestly, I don't have the time or the energy to bridge the gap between this person's understanding and reality. I have chores to do. 😆🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐🐐

But for real, if you have a question or a concern about how we do things here, I am genuinely willing to have a conversation about it, provided this isn't your approach: 🥴🫣

It has been a quiet week at the Little Farm Shop, so we used it as an opportunity to update our website a little bit! Still need to add Rosie to our "Meet the Crew" page, but we now have directions and other helpful links! Let me know if I missed anything. :)

The Ones Who Don't Make It: Reflections on Loss
With life, comes death. On a farm, even a small one like ours, death has a profound impact. There is grief, frustration, exhaustion, helplessness, and grief again.
Oh, the highs are high, almost euphoric. The victories, the wonder, the pride, and deep fulfillment; the dopamine from hard-earned positive outcomes just cannot be matched elsewhere.
But as they say, "what goes up must come down." Attentive and diligent daily care, responsible land and herd management yields better outcomes, almost every time. Almost.
With animal husbandry, we strive to achieve a harmonious, mutually beneficial relationship between animal and farmer. For the animals, this means that food, water, protection from predators, parasites, and weather, preventive and emergency care are all provided. This body of work is no small task. "Nature," played out without any intervention, has a very high casualty rate. The care we strive to provide cuts the premature casualty rate to darn near zero. But not zero.
I was not brought up in this lifestyle. Everything is newly learned for me--nothing ingrained in my upbringing. The intuition I have today has come from great mentorship, effort and time; time learning, observing, adjusting, improving, and pruning away anything that does not work, and watching for the result. The better things go, the more winning starts to feel like the result of a formula that can be reproduced at will.
When your casualty rate is very low and your success is high, you can forget that nature is still going to play her hand and sometimes she will win. It is painfully humbling when she does.
Since 2022, 52 new lives have been born to my little herd of goats. Of those, 50 have survived until weaning, when they leave to start their lives on other farms. That's 96%. Even past a year, to my knowledge, 46 of these kids born on my farm are still living today. That would be about a 92% survival rate past a year. For perspective, goat kids in the wild have a survival rate of about 50-65%, going into their first winter.

So as I was grappling with the swift illness and loss of Clover's boy, Sgt. Douglas, watching him suffer as I battled to save his life, wondering if I could have done better, intervened sooner; grieving for Clover, calling for her baby as her udder fills for him... I have to remind myself that I am not 100% in control of the outcome of every life.
Every part of me wanted to restore him to health. To watch him play and jump and among the rest of the animals I love and care about so much.
But in caring for a sick or dying animal, comes with the responsibility to "make the call" when survival is unlikely or not possible. To end the suffering involved in the battle to live. Mercy on a farm, even a small one like ours, will sometimes mean ending a life you invested everything in. All the time, the hope, the joy, the effort, the blood, sweat and tears, the investment of the heart and the soul.
With life, comes death. I share this with you, a reflection of the painful truth that governs us all. I feel fortunate to have had a quiet day yesterday to process all of this and to grieve and cry in privacy.

Today, my work resumes to care for the lives I have promised I would do everything for. We will be picking up a fresh batch of hay and I will relish in the joy of watching them devour it in big mouthfuls. I will give extra love and attention to Clover and all the babies still prancing around, living their best lives.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share my heart with you.

Please say a prayer for Clover's boy, Sgt. Douglas. Thank you.

Hey guys, Cati here. Sorry, but I won't have any of our fresh sourdough 🍞 this weekend due to illness. I apologize for the inconvenience, but I am sick sick sick. I hope you'll use this opportunity to pick up some goodies from another local stand. Try Goatin' Crazy Farms or Valley View Dairy, LLC! Thanks for continuing to shop locally. See you next week!