Author: ebeth

Here are some animals I saw recently:

And here are things that are growing:

Grass is grass is grass, right? Well, not exactly.

As far as putting our cows on pasture, we are glad for any kind of grass. But this demonstrates that grass is not grass is not grass. There are differences.

• Bake with them. Once I had a customer who loved to have my eggs put into cookies. The cookies rose better and tasted better than store bought eggs.
• Mix an egg with oatmeal or granola. Dressing up oatmeal this way also involves adding some variation of oil and butter, dried fruit, seeds, nuts, applesauce, and yogurt. It makes a deluxe breakfast!
• Fry the eggs with bacon or sausage.
• Serve the fried egg as a sandwich with a slice of cheese, lettuce, mayonnaise, or tomatoes on bread or tortilla. Lightly grill the bread for a toasted sandwich.

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• Hard boil the eggs. OR steam boil the eggs. Eat them with a little bit of salt.
  • Chop up, mix with mayo, mustard, cottage cheese, chopped onions, chopped pickles, or chopped olives. Add tuna for extra protein. Serve on bread or over lettuce.
  • Mix with cooked potatoes for potato salad.
  • Mix with cooked pasta for pasta salad.
• Make fried rice. OR make the egg pancake from the fried rice recipe and make sauteed veggies and add cut up egg pancake as the protein.
• Magic quiche was our go-to winter egg recipe for years. Or lightly saute veggies in a skillet, sprinkle with cheese, top with 4-6 blended eggs with a little bit of milk. Bake at 375F until the eggs are set.

Lots of things you can do with eggs.

John Klein lived around the big block from us. We met him sometime in the early 2000s. Over the years he had supplemented his income by raising veggies for market, but by the time we knew him he was primarily making hay. He had several nice fields that he would mow, rake and bale. Then he would sell the hay off the field to several customers, including us, and sell from the barn to several other customers.

Making hay is hot, hard work, but John enjoyed it. He was good at it, too! He was glad to help those who needed hay for their animals and was glad to work the land.

John had a small field near his house, about an acre or two. He would mow, rake and bale this section first to make sure everything was working like it should. The tractors that pulled the equipment needed to work properly, the mowers teeth needed to cut, the rake needed to rake right, and the baler needed to pack the hay the right way and string the bales the right way. The small field was the right size to confirm everything was working. It was also near enough to the house and barn that, if he needed to fix something, he could go get parts and make the necessary repairs.

About 3 1/2 years ago John was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. “And you know what that means?” he said when he told us. “It means you have one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel!” Over the past 3 1/2 years John had several rounds of chemo and several surgeries. He also became more vocal about his faith. He reminded us that he was trusting Christ in the whole cancer business whether it meant him being healed or him getting to his real home, heaven, sooner. A few times he was without any evidence of cancer. For that spell he felt that God had healed him. And then the cancer came back. And finally he had no more treatment options and was put on hospice. Being extremely independent he lived on his own until the last week of his life. Finally he passed on to his real home and was healed permanently.

In our early interactions, John was just a fellow farmer, the neighbor man that we got our hay from. And we primarily had a business relationship with him. But as time progressed, we would take more time to visit. And in the last 3 1/2 years we would catch up with long telephone calls every few months. This included friendships with my sons. John cared about them and what they were doing in their lives.

John was a good man, had a good work ethic, and had a good sense of how things should be. Of course we will miss the hay from our “backyard neighbor.” But even more we will miss John, our friend. Be at peace.

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Occasionally we will bring your attention to other enterprises that are working towards the same goals as we are. Here is info about Food Waste Collection Business that is thinking of starting in the Syracuse area.

Greetings! I’m excited to be doing market research about creating a residential food waste collection business. The structure of this service is simple:

• Receive a bucket/welcome packet
• Put out the bucket weekly for pickup of food waste, including: Fruit, beans, bones, bread, coffee grounds, coffee filters, eggs, dairy, fish, grains, meat, paper cups, paper napkins, paper towels, tea bags, and vegetables.
• After we pick up your bucket and drop off a clean one, your food waste goes to a composting site. This keeps it out of the trash, landfills and in the case of fats/oils your drain.

The cost of this service covers transportation cost, drop off fees and hourly wage for workers. Our mission is to keep costs affordable because we believe in supporting our community. Payment would be a monthly subscription model. As we get info from our survey, possible perks or other benefits could be created.  

Please take 5 mins to fill out this survey in order to help us know how to support the community better.  Market Research Survey – Click Here

It’s a simple idea. But the benefits could be felt for years to come.

• When it is trapped in a landfill, food waste decomposes slowly, and without oxygen. This process produces methane, which is a greenhouse gas 84 times more powerful than CO2 over a 20-year period.
• Food scraps contain valuable nutrients that are good for the soil. Finished compost can be used in gardens, farms, and landscaping.  
• Generating less trash conserves landfill/incinerator space.
• Composting puts your waste to work supporting composters, local farmers, and food scrap haulers. 
• Without food scraps in it, garbage is cleaner and less smelly.
• Less garbage can mean a lower fee depending on your service options. 

Thank you for taking the time to help us as we try to recapture food waste. Please reach out with any questions or comments. Aaron Southwick – cnyfoodscrapper@gmail.com

(Disclaimer: we are not a dairy farm and we do not sell milk; however, we do have a milk cow that provides milk for the family, so we do have a little bit of experience in the field. Also our cows are Angus/Holstein/Jersey crosses. The Holstein/Jersey provides the milkfat, and the Angus helps keep it in a smaller quantity.)

Anybody with any sort of experience with (mammal) pregnancy and childbirth knows that this is not the case – it is after a baby is born that milk is produced to feed the baby.

But wait! Aren’t you missing an important step?

That’s right! How are the baby calves made here at Southwick Family Farm? For those of you unaware, there have been many human babies and children running around on the farm, and it’s not really safe for us kids to be around a bull.

It was practically a family tradition for all the kids to go out and sit on hay bales to watch. Terribly exciting stuff we got to do. Hopefully the semen would take, the cow would be pregnant, and we’d have a new calf after nine months. Then we would have milk again.

And there you have it – animal sex ed part 2.

~ Parmenides

Behold, friends! A new blog series, all about common misconceptions about farmers, farming, and other related things. written by the Farmer’s three youngest children under pseudonyms. Brownie points to anybody who can guess the real identity behind the writers!

So what happens if a rooster is with the egg-laying hens and there’s some baby-making action going on? That means there might be fertilized eggs, which have the potential to become baby chicks if the hen sits on the eggs long enough for chick development. We currently have four roosters with our layers, so the vast majority of the eggs we sell are probably fertilized. But our hens don’t sit on the eggs and so the chicks don’t develop.

So there you have it – animal sex ed part 1. ~ Parmenides

Here are pics of the turkeys this year, newest to oldest, top to bottom.

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During the winter season – November through May – we still sell our meats, eggs, and veggies as we have them available. Our available items are listed here.

We have three ways you can get our items:

• Pick up from the farm – all of our items are available from the farm. We prefer preorders, so that we can have it ready for you or let you know if it isn’t available. Call/text – 315.200.2341 or email us at sales@tojfarm.com
• Meet up at Barry Park – on the second Wednesday of each month between 3:00 and 3:30 we will bring preordered items to the south end of Barry Park. For 22-23 season the dates are Nov. 9, Dec. 14, Jan. 11., Feb. 8, Mar. 8, Apr. 12, May 10.
• Delivery to your home or location choice – For $5-15 depending on your location we will deliver to your home. Delivery in locations in areas that we normally travel are $5, in locations within 10 mi are $10, and over 10 mi are $15. On occasion we will waive our fee. Delivery is at our convenience, preferably on the second Wednesday of the month.

Want to know about this month’s offerings? Sign up here –

We use an opt-in form, so after you sign up, please check your email to confirm your email address. Then you will receive emails about what we have available. We look forward to hearing from you.