The “Why” Behind Deer Creek Pastures: Food, Health, and a Different Way of Living
If you’ve been following along here for a while, you’ve seen pieces of this journey. The early fences, the first sheep, the behind-the-scenes reality of doing this largely on my own and, at times, wearing every hat whether I felt qualified to or not. I’ve shared a bit of the how in my earlier post,…
The Many Hats of a Solo Farmer: What It Really Takes to Run a Small Farm
One of the things I have learned since starting Deer Creek Pastures is that a solo farmer does not just farm. A solo farmer wears hats. A lot of them. And not just the wide brimmed hats and baseball caps that I wear daily to protect my skin from the sun. When people picture farming…
Flock Update: New Lambs, Clean Tests, and a Few Sleepless Nights
In February 2026, the author experienced a transformative lambing season at Deer Creek Pastures. They welcomed new lambs, faced the loss of animals, and navigated challenges with biosecurity and care. The season marked significant growth in the flock and personal development, highlighting the emotional complexities of farming and its rewards.
Navigating Climate Chaos: Farming in Hurricanes and Winter Storms
If you work in climate and sustainability long enough, you start to think you understand weather extremes. You read the reports, analyze the models, track the trends, and talk calmly about resilience and adaptation in conference rooms and over Zoom meetings. In the professional realm, I am intimately familiar with physical and transition risks associated…
Still Here, Still Farming: A 2025 Year in Review
If I had to sum up 2025 in one sentence, it would be this: I started the year eager to grow, spent most of it wondering if I was failing, and ended it realizing just how much ground I actually covered. Year two of farming was supposed to be about rhythm. About applying the lessons…
Let’s Talk About Everyone’s Favorite Buzzword: AI
If you work in the corporate world, or just exist in the year 2025, you can’t walk five feet or scroll the internet without hearing about AI. Artificial Intelligence, data centers, energy loads, and the wildly unnecessary overuse of the em dash, it’s everywhere. But here at Deer Creek Pastures, while I may work in…
Diary of a Farmer: Running on Caffeine, Stubbornness, and Spreadsheets
If the last year has taught me anything, it’s that farming has a hilarious, deeply cynical sense of humor, and I’m usually the punchline. Between navigating a humbling sheep disease, introducing cattle, managing an orchard, and quietly plotting a ginseng project in the woods, I’ve figured out what truly fuels Deer Creek Pastures: caffeine, stubbornness,…
Quarantine, Culling, and Questions About the Future of the Flock
It has been a hard summer here at Deer Creek Pastures. For those who have been following along, you know that earlier this summer I shared about Elderberry’s diagnosis with Caseous Lymphadenitis (CL) and the difficult decision to euthanize her, as well as my testing strategy to monitor health and rid the flock of CL.…
Flock Health Update: CL Testing, Euthanasia, and Next Steps
A few weeks ago, I shared a painful update on Elderberry, one of my ewes, and her confirmed case of Caseous Lymphadenitis (CL). After weighing my options, I made the difficult decision to euthanize her. It was not a choice I made lightly, but it was the right one, for her comfort and for the…
Biohazard in the Pastures: Caseous Lymphadenitis
It Started with a Lump It started quietly, as these things often do. A few weeks back, I noticed a firm lump on Elderberry’s shoulder, a round golf ball sized bump, still covered in her black hair, that could’ve been anything. It has subsequently grown to the size of a tennis ball, and her hair…
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