4 days ago

New Frontier Farms LLC

Today I'm talking with Maggie at New Frontier Farms LLC. You can follow on Facebook as well.

 

Muck Boots 

Calendars.Com

If you'd like to support me in growing this podcast, like, share, subscribe or leave a comment. Or just buy me a coffee 

https://buymeacoffee.com/lewismaryes

00:00
You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters.  I'm your host, Mary Lewis. Today I'm talking with Maggie at New Frontier Farms LLC in Lonsdale, Minnesota. Good morning, Maggie. How are you? Good morning. I'm good. How are you? I'm good. I would ask how the weather is, but since I'm only about 15 miles away from you, it's gray and cloudy and may might rain, right? Yes. That seems to be the theme this summer.

00:29
Yes, and thank God it's not just constant pouring rain like it was last year. I don't know how you guys did, but our garden did really poorly last year.

00:40
Yeah, so I actually had a baby in March and I really underestimated how having a March baby would impact the farm compared to a September baby.  And so we didn't plant a garden.  But oh,  because I had the baby and it was just it was a lot between kidding and camming and farrowing and the baby.  The garden did not get planted. But everyone told me my garden did terrible this year. And I was like, you know, maybe this was a good year to not not plant a garden.

01:08
Yes, we, my husband's the gardener. I've talked about this a lot on the podcast and he planted tomatoes three different times. And I think we got our first tomato at the end of August last year. Oh goodness, that's crazy. Yeah. I like to joke. Um, I grew bacon seeds instead, cause I have to put my piglets on my garden. Um, things are growing great this year. So I think they did a good job of fertilizing, but it was all we could manage last year was bacon seeds. Well, you're only one person.

01:37
and you were growing a human and then birthing a human, so that is completely understandable.  Okay, so I'm really excited to chat with you this morning because I looked at your Facebook page and you have so many things going on, so tell me about yourself  and your farm. Yeah, so  my husband and I have wanted to be farmers our entire life. We both grew up  one generation removed from production agriculture, and so our grandparents farmed, but our parents had chosen to not.

02:05
And my mom had always wanted to be a farmer, but she was  turning 18 during the 80s farm crisis and my grandpa just didn't want that. It was not a  lucrative career at the time. And so my mom has always worked in agriculture.  And then we always had beef cattle on our farm.  was my grandpa's retirement gig. And so he retired from dairy cattle and got a hundred beef cows.  So I grew up spending my summers in the pasture with the cows and fell in love with.

02:34
with everything to do with farming. I was very involved in 4-H,  which just kind of fostered that love. And  I went to South Dakota State University and I studied dairy production and speech communication  with a minor in animal science,  all with the goal of someday owning my own farm.  While I was there, I met a man in a similar situation.  He wanted to have his own farm someday too. And  so we fell in love and that's my husband, Nick.

03:02
We got married in 2017.  And right after college, we actually worked on a ranch  and it was a really good experience.  We were kind of thrown to the wolves and had to care for 600 head of beef cows  on 20,000 acres in western South Dakota.  It was  a cool experience. We gained a lot of  knowledge in a very short amount of time. And then we worked various in town jobs after that.  Our oldest son came a little early.

03:31
Um, and that kind of whole experience really pushed us back home to Minnesota. So we moved back home with the entire intent of buying a farm. Um, we moved in late 2019. Um, and by the time we were working on selling our house in South Dakota, COVID had hit, um, and it had really, you know, changed the landscape of people at the beginning of COVID people weren't buying houses. Um, so it stalled things out, but we finally found our farm here.

04:00
in May of 2020 in Lonsdale. So we purchased that. We have 36 acres. 18 of those acres were in cropland when we purchased it, but it's all highly erodible land. And so we turned it all into pasture. It's not very good cropland. So it's been quite a few years process turning all that into grassland and it was very eroded. So a lot of our topsoil is in our swamp.

04:30
And so it will be many, many, many years until  much of it is really fertile again.  But we are seeing a lot of progress. It's made between our chickens, our pigs and our cows.  It's getting there, but it's been a process. So  we milk a herd of dairy goats.  We milk about  eight right now.  We have a herd of cooney cooney pigs.  They're kind of our primary product. So we sell a lot of pork. We do a lot of haves and holes, and then we do individual cuts.

05:00
And then we have  a very small herd of beef cows. It's a pretty hard time to get into beef right now.  So we just have a small  herd.  And then we raise meat chickens every summer and we have a small egg laying herd, a flock as well. Awesome. That's a lot, Maggie. You're doing  amazing things. Thank you  for regenerating your crop land because it's really important.

05:26
Luckily, that was kind of my husband's thing. My husband has always really enjoyed soil. He likes that crop piece.  His family's got some ties to agriculture through the crop side. And he had an internship at a really cool ranch in South Dakota during college that they're really at the forefront of trying out cover crops and trying different grazing patterns and really doing a lot of things to regenerate the soil while also  growing really nice cows on it.

05:55
So that experience was really helpful in helping him prepare our land.  So that's, been. And I  always say I'm the cow manager and he just makes sure they have food. he really.  Okay.  Awesome. I'm so glad that younger people are starting to do this stuff because we need you. We need people like you  to do these things.

06:21
because so many farmers, ranchers, homesteaders are aging out. And I want to have hope that people are going to keep doing this. Yeah, I hope so. It's really hard to get into, especially as first generation. There's a lot of things that we miss out on. We don't have that generational knowledge that, oh, well, back in 1995, this is what the weather did, and this is how we adapted, or this is what fluke thing happened to this one cow one time.

06:51
And that generational knowledge is really something that we're missing.  We also don't have that equipment piece that can be handed down. so we're scouring actions and getting what we can at our price point.  We operate a debt-free operation, so we don't take out operating loans,  which makes it  very slow growing.  But  I don't have a banker breathing down my neck, so I appreciate that. So  my  sister married into a  multi-generational farm. And sometimes I look at that and I see,

07:20
you I really wish we could have that.  You know, and then you hear about all the family drama that everybody has and I'm like, you know, maybe some days it's good to be a first generation.

07:33
Well, you set the rules and  then people can follow in your footsteps later.  And I was going to say slow growing is better than bankruptcy.  Yeah, hopefully.  So keep growing slow and it'll happen.

07:52
Okay, so  I was looking at your Facebook page, like I said, because every time I talk to somebody, go  do my research.  Are you having a book sale at your farm in July? Yeah, so it's been my goal this year to host one event that is in a farm market on our farm.  Over the last year, we have renovated the upstairs of our late 1800 barn to be kind of an event space.

08:17
And so I started looking into what events we could host. So last month we hosted a barn dance.  Um,  and  I, over the last decade have gotten really back into reading  and there's a couple of Minnesota authors that I was like, Oh, it would be so cool to have them out to the farm. And so I started kind of working with other businesses. I found a mobile bookstore and I was like, Hey, I have this idea. Do you want to come out to the farm? And she was like, yeah, that'd be great. And so I reached out to these authors and.

08:47
Two of them said yes,  and I could not believe it.  One of them, especially as my favorite author of all time, Jess Lowry,  she has a book coming out four days before our event and she still said yes. So I'm super excited to have them come out.  So it'll be kind of my goal is like the book fair when you were a kid, only now for grownups.  So we'll have the book vendor and then we have a couple other vendors  that just sell bookish things.  And then we'll have the author come out for a Q &A.

09:16
And  then book signing and then we're also going to have some spots throughout our goat pasture so people can buy a book and read and hang out with our goats. And  I joke that I'm putting on this event for me because I really want it and I hope other people are excited about it too.  That is so much fun.  I saw it and I was like a book fair on a farm. I freaking love it. That's brilliant.  Yeah, yeah, I'm really excited. We've had a lot of people be really excited about it too.

09:45
You know, and  summer, it's really hard because all the weekends are busy. So hopefully we'll have a good turnout, but  it'll be a fun day.  hope it goes really well for you. And it's so,  I'm going to make a pun,  novel. What a novel idea, Maggie.  Thank you. Thank you. I'm surprised my dog didn't just bark because her name is Maggie. And I said your name really loud. She must not be upstairs right now.  Okay.  So  what else can I ask you?

10:15
I had all kinds of questions and then I yelled Maggie's name and got totally distracted with the fact that I yelled the dog's name because I'm crazy like that. So tell me about the pork sale because we bought a whole hog a couple years back, well probably 70 years back from people in Wisconsin and we ended up butchering

10:42
both halves because we bought a half and a friend of ours bought a half. So we butchered the pig in our garage. And so when you sell your halves and wholes, do you sell them to people and then they're butchered and then people just pick up the butchered meat in freezer paper? Yeah, so we work with a local processor, Odenthal Meats. We really like them because they're a state-inspected facility, state equal to.

11:11
So we can sell haves and holes where people can get kind of that state exempt where they're just picking up in white packages.  And so we're technically selling the live animal to the person they're paying for the processing.  That or if I don't have it sold, I can get it state inspected and put it in my freezer to be able to sell on our farm for individual cuts.  So I really enjoy working with them because we do have that flexibility.  We have not sold it to anybody yet to butcher themselves.

11:39
We don't get a lot of interest in that.  Well, we probably wouldn't have been interested in it either, except that my husband hunts and he's butchered deer before. So it's like, can't be that hard to butcher a pig. I was like, no, probably not.  Plus we don't really care if the cuts are  pretty. We care that they're going to taste good. Yes. Yeah. Oh, and it saves you a ton.  And that's really been the biggest struggle for us is the processing costs. It's just...

12:08
When we started, it was 89 cents a pound. That was four years ago, and now it's $1.39 a pound. It's gone up astronomical. Trying to be able to keep up with that and try to make money, it's been pretty tough. Yeah. Everything to do with money right now is really tough, and I hate that.

12:34
I hate that you guys are busting your asses to do this for the community.  And  I'm sure that you're hurting and feeling the pinch just like everybody else is.  Yeah, for sure. And that's why we started looking into events. I said,  what's a way we could bring in money to the farm that we don't have a big upfront cost? Because in animal agriculture, we have so much upfront cost. We have so much upfront risk in everything we do.

13:02
And so if we were looking to add another one of those products, know, just like the cows, you know, you're spending a thousand dollars on calves right now,  but you don't get that return for another two years.  And so we started doing the events because it was like, Hey, I could plan it today. could have it in a month and have that direct return on investment right away.  Yep. And it's a really good idea, Maggie. mean,

13:25
I would never have thought to have a book fair at a farm. just, I love that so much, but I'm also a book fan. I love to read and I have since I was in first grade. So, so for me, it's a no brainer. What a great combination of things. Thank you. Yeah. It's, and I think with book talk, it's really starting to pick back up. You know, you're getting a lot of people that are getting back into it with the accessibility of audio books and everything. So I think.

13:55
Now is a good time  to be promoting books because people are excited about it.  Yeah.  If I had more time and if I had more money, which none of us have right now, would start a... I have two podcasts. One is kind of on hiatus right now.  I would start a third and it would be about reviewing books and talking to the authors of the books. I just can't do it right now, but it's still percolating in the back of my brain for next year.

14:24
I haven't decided yet, but I'm thinking about it.  That would be something I wouldn't try something like that. I love talking about books. I started our local book club and I'm  in two book clubs now because I love being able to talk to people about books and get other people's thoughts. I think that's kind of the coolest part of book club is  you have this mind and this idea in your head of what this book was and then you go in and you're wait,

14:50
You thought it was that? And I think it's just really cool to hear other people's thoughts on it. Yeah. And it's really funny because when you read a book, you may get a description of the main character in words, but your brain processes that word description differently than someone else's brain does. Yeah. Yeah. Or it impacts them in different ways because of their experiences. Like I remember I was in a book club a few years ago and we had read a self-help book.

15:19
And  I personally just didn't like it.  It seemed  like a lot of fluff, but not actual advice. And  I thought the people in a book club also would feel the same way. And I got there and they all loved it. And I was like, wow, wow, I did not expect that. But you know, I think it's just cool to hear other people's thoughts on things. And the other thing is, is I think that certain books are  not readable at certain times  for you or for me. I have picked up a book.

15:49
I don't know the name of I picked up a book 20 years ago, sat down to read it, got two chapters in and went, no,  and never finished it.  And then I picked it up again five years ago and started reading it and was completely engrossed.  I couldn't put it down. So I think that there are seasons for books, just like there are seasons for gardening and raising animals. Yes.  Yeah, for sure. And I think that the book at that time was a big hit.  And now

16:18
you know, this is probably seven years later.  It's had a huge backlash, you know, so I think it's interesting over time how books age and how people's thoughts on it change, personally and as a society too.

16:32
Yeah. And with self-help books, your mileage may vary every single time. Yeah. Yeah.  So, but I don't really want to talk about books. still need to start that podcast so I can talk about books.  Do you guys have dogs?  Yeah. we have,  Deesil is,  oh my gosh, she's almost 11.  She's been,  we got her in college, so she's been through every important point.

17:02
point in my life so far.  So she is our kind of wherever we are dog. So if we're on the house, she's in the house. If we're outside, she's outside.  She's the protector of my kids. She was a rescue,  but we believe she is a lab border collie.  And then we have Mabel who is our farm dog. She is a fox red lab. She is  very, very pretty. And she is my go with the flow, just very chill. She's only three.

17:32
And I always joke that when people come to the farm, they would assume Mabel was the 10 year old dog and Diesel was the puppy because they have exact opposite personalities to where they should be in life. Diesel is a very high, high energy. She's a border collie. She's very high energy, even at 11, almost 11. Good. I mean, she's going to be around for a while. I hope so. She injured her back last year, so she has slowed down a little bit. But she's.

18:01
We worked with a  dog chiropractor, which I didn't think I would do, but  the vet's option was just pain meds every single day, and I just didn't think that was good long term.  So we looked into a dog chiropractor, and that actually helped a lot.  She made a lot of improvement. She's still not jumping up on the bed anymore,  but she's comfortable going upstairs and walking all around and running and playing.  Awesome. Good.  I love my dog more than life itself.

18:30
Anything to prolong a dog's life as long as they are happy and have quality of life. I am all for  So do you sell stuff at the farmers markets in your area? So we did we were doing  Like our first couple years of business.  I was doing like two to four markets a week  And it was a lot  it it got to be a lot And we just weren't finding the profitability that we needed

19:00
You know, we were up in the Twin Cities, you know, so we were paying anywhere between $50 and $60 every market. And then, you know, when you're only selling $400 a day, just doesn't get, you know, it's just not price. It just wasn't where we needed to be price-wise. And just, you know, I'd have to pack all my kids in the car. I would have to drive there and then say, hey, this is this 10-foot box you have to stand in.

19:28
So it was just, it was really tough on us. And so we took a step back.  We started only doing our local markets. And then I would do once a month delivery to the Twin Cities. So we could still support those customers that we had already established.  But we didn't have to stand there for a whole day. I could just drive up for a few hours, get things delivered and drive back.  And then last year, we started doing on  farm markets. I think we did  three of them last year,  opening up

19:58
our farm to have people come out so they can see where their food is coming from.  And that was  fairly successful,  nothing too crazy. And then this year we really pushed the marketing  and we're doing one market a month  on our farm and then in addition to one of those events.  We also have started doing horseback rides with our horses  and make it more of  a family focused event. And so  we have a play place  kind of thing in our barn.

20:28
We have lots of things for your kids to come and play while you shop.  And now we even have local vendors come. So we have a sourdough,  a cookie, and then we always have some sort of like craft or sewer.  And this month we're having a coffee shop. So I'm really excited about that.  Just kind of making it a destination place for people to come and let their kids have fun and experience that farm life  that a lot of people are striving for right now that want to get closer to the land. And we can kind of offer that.

20:57
Awesome. So you're basically doing a version of agritourism. Yeah. Yeah. And that was always my dream. You know, I have a background as a dairy princess way back in the day. And I also competed in the Miss America system and my platform was all about promoting dairy. And so with that background, I've always wanted to be able to open the barn doors to people and have them, you know, get their hands dirty and know where their food comes and be able to ask the questions and

21:26
And I think we provide a unique perspective.  We're  trained in conventional agriculture, but we can't afford conventional agriculture.  And so we are farming different than conventional.  And I think we can  provide unique answers to those questions because we do have  a unique background that kind of covers the landscape of agriculture. Yeah. And listening to you talk,

21:53
I'm sure that when people ask you about the differences between the two, you make it so that people can understand that the differences, you're not all science terms and Latin names. Yeah, yeah, I think it's important for them to be able to answer those questions. And I think it's also important as farmers to understand that not everybody can afford our type of agriculture. And that's why I think it's important that we have all types of agriculture is because

22:20
There needs to be agriculture at every price point. There needs to be food at every price point.  And I think that's important that we never do slander marketing.  I think we see that a lot  in farms our size that they're scaring people away from other types of  agriculture. And it's always in my goal that people align with me  and they trust me to raise their agriculture. That's why they're buying with me.  They trust me to raise their pork or their beef.

22:49
that we raise a really delicious product.  And so I never want to scare people away from other people to come to us.  I always want them to choose us because our food tastes great  and they align with us.  Absolutely. It's the no like trust thing.  And that's true in any business. If people don't know you, like you and trust you,  they're not going to come back. Yeah.  Yeah, absolutely.

23:19
And  I've been learning a lot about marketing over the last two years since I started the podcast and I had heard somebody say  no like trust before and I didn't  understand what they were talking about regarding business. got it as a person,  but I didn't realize that if you are the business, then people have to know like and trust the business as well as no like and trust you. Absolutely.  And I think that has always

23:48
been something that I've really enjoyed. I've always really enjoyed storytelling. I've always really enjoyed  connecting with people. That's why I enjoyed being a dairy princess and things like that, because I got to connect and make those  interactions and  be able  to talk to people. And so being able to offer that now  has been really enjoyable.

24:09
I am really happy that you enjoy people. I am an introvert. really, really, really don't like a lot of people in my space. It really makes me anxious.  And part of the reason I started the podcast is because I wanted to talk to people, but I didn't want to have to be around a lot of people in person. And it has worked out so great, Tell it.  The other thing that we do here, because I am here with my son during the day, my husband works full time.

24:38
is we have a farm stand and people can just  pull in the driveway,  get what they want out of the farm stand, pay for it and take off. And  we have our phone number on the whiteboard in the farm stand if they have a question, but basically it's a self-serve thing.  And I love it and people love it. I mean, we have people stop by every day all summer long.  Yeah, that's awesome. So it really...

25:05
It's a really good way to move all our excess produce because my husband is a fanatic about gardening.  And so we always have way too much, even though we sell at the farmer's market, we still have way too much.  what's your favorite part about your life besides your husband and your kids? What's your favorite part about the life you've chosen?

25:28
That's a really good question.

25:33
I think my favorite is this time of year when it starts to cool down at night and it stays lighter later and just being outside. I think especially in the livestock game, you can get burned out really fast. And I found that to cure my burnout, I need to spend more time with my animals, which seems counterintuitive. But I found that

26:03
I need to just be with them because that's why I enjoy it. That's why, you know, growing up, I would just  be in the pasture for hours and hours and hours and I wouldn't do anything. I would just spend the time with the cows and  you know, now we have checklists and things we need to get done and I think we sometimes forget  to slow down and enjoy it. But this is why, this is why we did it. This is why we wanted to be farmers. And so I've been trying to be more intentional over the last year of just stopping and being  and enjoying the animals.

26:33
for who they are and for why we love them and why we enjoy it. I think that's amazing. We had meat rabbits a couple of years ago and it was a big fail. Our rabbits didn't get the memo they were supposed to reproduce blah, blah, blah. I've talked about a lot on the podcast. But my favorite part of those rabbits was we ended up bringing in a mama and her babies because it was so hot in June when she had her babies that we lost some of the babies to the heat.

27:03
And so for a month I had baby rabbit in a container on my table in my kitchen. And I got to hang out with those baby rabbits and watch them grow and change. And the mama trusted me completely. It was so  fun.

27:19
And it was just so like I would get up in the morning, grab my cup of coffee, get half of it down me and then sit in a chair  and hang out with those baby rabbits for half an hour. And I just loved every second of it.  Yeah. And we do that with our baby goats. And when they kid,  you know, in February, March, we start them out for the first few days in the  house.  And it's always really fun. The boys love it. And this year, my youngest was

27:47
just turning one when we had baby goats in the house. And so he was thrilled that  he could pet them and touch them. And so it's always a really fun time when you can have them in the house. And  we've brought piglets in the house and  all that. And it's nice when they can be. My mom always shakes her head because  my mom had a very strict no animals in the house rule.  And so  she always laughs and is like, oh, of course, Maggie has a piglet on the couch hanging out with her kids.

28:13
It's nice when you can have those moments to slow down and enjoy them. Yeah, and the joy of being a grown-up with your own life is to make those choices for yourself. Yeah, I always joke with my, you got to be careful what you tell your kids they can't have because my parents had two very strict rules. We couldn't have a horse and we couldn't have pigs. And now I have three horses and I've raised over 150 pigs.

28:41
So be careful what you tell your kids you can't have.  Yeah, just like be careful what you wish for. You might just get it.  Exactly. Okay, well, I try to keep you to half an hour, Maggie, and we're almost there. can people find you?  So we're on social media at New Frontier Farms, LLC. I'm a little bit more active on Instagram than Facebook just because it works a little bit better with my phone.

29:08
You can also check out our website, newfrontierfrontrooms.org. That's kind of everywhere.  Awesome.  And if you want to see some beautiful pictures of Maggie's place, you should check out her Instagram and her Facebook because there are some beautiful photos there. Well, thank you. Photography is a little hobby of mine that I really enjoy. So thank you.  You're welcome. As always, people can find me at atinyhomesteadpodcast.com.  Maggie, I hope you have a fantastic day.

29:38
Thank you, you too. Thank you.

 

Comment (0)

No comments yet. Be the first to say something!

Copyright 2023 All rights reserved.

Podcast Powered By Podbean

Version: 20241125