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Always Come Down the Mountain – Let’s Try Something Fun.
In the most recent season of Clarkson’s Farm, Farmer Harriet told Jeremy “Always come down the mountain.” What was she talking about? When it comes to sheep, does the mountain matter? There is nothing fashionable about the stratified hill system. It was born when British farmers were trying hard to find ways to grow food…
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What Hay Can Tell You (with just your eyeballs)
There is a lot of knowledge to be gained by looking at hay. When you start to pull it apart, what story is hiding in your bales and how might it change or impact the way you use them? You don’t need to know the Latin names, you don’t need a forage analysis, you don’t…
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Poor Man’s Fertilizer
If the ground is frozen anyway, do trees, shelterbelts and partial canopy really matter when it comes to soil moisture? There’s an old prairie saying that snow is the “poor man’s fertilizer.” On the surface it sounds quaint — but there’s real science behind it, especially in Alberta’s cold, semi-arid landscape. However, in order to…
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When Fire Isn’t an Option
What happens when an ecosystem that evolved with fire doesn’t burn? There are places where fire is the right tool—and places where it simply isn’t available to us, even when the ecology is practically begging for it. Regulations, neighbours, smoke risk, volatile weather, liability, proximity to infrastructure… sometimes “prescribed burn” is not a lever you…
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Hay Is NOT a Failure
Is hay a fallback? Or an integral part of your SUMMER feeding strategy? There’s a quiet assumption in livestock culture that grass is success and hay is compromise. Particularly in the regenerative agriculture space, there is a sense that if one resorts to hay, it’s a management error. But that only makes sense if we…
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AMP Management: A Pod Case Study
Making wise choices so we can choose good consequences. First, a quick disclaimer:This is not a grazing template or prescription. This is a record of what we did in one specific pod, with our flock, on our soils, under our weather patterns in the Alberta foothills. Stocking rate, rest periods, timing, and even animal behavior…
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Barely? No, BARLEY
How does barley straw impact feed and hygiene? If you ever visit our place in winter, you’ll notice something almost immediately: we use a lot of barley straw. Not just a little “sprinkle for bedding.” Straw is a structural element in our winter system. It’s part of how we keep the flock comfortable, how we…
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Reading a Hay Analysis
Can your sheep get the most out of your feeding program? Understanding feed analysis and making the most of what you’ve got. . . . and why two local fields can feed two different futures. On our farm, hay isn’t just a winter stopgap — considering that “winter” can happen for basically eight or 9…
Providence Lane Homestead 