Farmer Julia's Blog

People often ask what breed our pigs are and the answer is... well, it's a little complicated! Our first venture into heritage breed pigs came back in 2012 when we purchased two piglets from a small farm in Chilliwack. Their mother was Tamworth and their father was Berkshire. We've been hooked on heritage hogs every since and our breeding stock include Berkshire, Tamworth, Large Black and Duroc bloodlines. When we talk about “heritage” breeds, we are making a distinction between the conventional “pink pigs” most commonly raised at industrial hog farms and more traditional, “old-fashioned” breeds. Conventional pigs have been...

We welcomed spring with our neighbours and a bonfire this week. It has been a hell of a week already and it's only Thursday. We've had 12 litters of piglets so far this year and have been very busy weaning them and getting them all off to their new homes. Now, catching pigs is a tricky business on a good day but this time of year it is especially treacherous and we find ourselves slipping on the layer of sheer ice that is often hidden under 6 inches of mud in all the high traffic areas of the pastures. We...

This is the story of how a relatively routine veterinary matter took over our Facebook page and 3 million people got to see my hot pink bra. Somehow, Penny, our very pregnant dairy cow somehow managed to tear her eyelid damn near clean off. I'll spare you the "before" photo but after the vet stitched her up, she advised me to protect the eye with a patch of denim and some glue. I thought "there has to be a better way" and so there was...... Had I known that the photo I snapped of Penny with her fancy new ophthalmological...

Piglet monsoon season is upon us and we will have 6 week old heritage breed piglets available starting on February 23rd. Our pigs are raised at our ranch just west of Merritt in the Coquihalla foothills. Our operation is GMO-free and our pigs are raised on pasture and woodland where they are free to run and root and frolic and forage. For more about how we raise our animals, please visit our "about us" page.  About our Piglets One of our berkshire/tamworth sows, Molly, with her new piglets Our pigs are a mix of heritage breeds including berkshire, tamworth, yorkshire, large...

After years of extolling the virtues of lard, I've not been able to convert as many of you as I would have liked or expected. So over the holidays, I decided to start experimenting to see what else I could do with it. I'm still working on the candles but I'm very happy to report that my first batch of soap seems to have been a great success! It isn't fancy. I haven't used a lot of exotic, imported ingredients & essential oils but I'm happy with the result and feel good about using overwhelmingly local ingredients.  I made 5...