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Winter/Spring, 2024

As usual, it’s been a while since we’ve posted anything here. We’re happy to say that the farm is still thriving and the Farm Stand business continues to grow. We are so thankful for our loyal customers that continue to visit us regularly, and the many new customers we have gained this past year. Your support means the world to us!

The water supply outlook has really improved with 2023 bringing in record rain and snowpack, and 2024 looking positive. Water is the lifeblood of every farm, and it sustains the plants and animals and natural habitats we have here on our farm, so it’s a relief when we see full reservoirs and snow in the mountains heading into spring and summer.

The almond bloom is beginning to fade, while the plums, apricots and peaches are beginning their bloom. This time of year is a lot of mowing and weed-eating, pruning, fixing and upgrading irrigation, and planning and planting veggies. The Farm Stand is stocked with delicious citrus right now and a new batch of hand-made goat milk soap, made with milk from our goats. We’re brainstorming new products for the Stand this year, and we’ve added a “suggestion” pad in the Stand, so if there’s anything you’d like us to consider stocking, let us know.

Here’s to a fruitful 2024!

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Winter 2023

Welcome to 2023! It’s been a while since we’ve posted, or updated our website.

The last three years of drought conditions have been hard on the landscape, and the extreme summer heat is hard on the animals, but our livestock and crops have made it through. We’re thankful for the irrigation water we were able to receive last year, although at a very high price. The early precipitation this winter is encouraging and we hope it continues over the next few months of our rainy season.

We’ve taken a break from breeding our goats these last two years. With the remarkable increase in feed prices, the market for goat kids has taken a hit. We’re very particular about selling our kids to good homes – if we breed and can’t find homes, we’d have to keep and feed the babies and that’s not feasible.

On the Farm Stand front, we’ve recently done some redecorating, extended the hours of operation, and added Venmo as a payment method! The Stand is now open four days per week – Thursdays through Sundays – from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. The Stand is loaded with some great citrus right now and local honey. Our hens are also picking up their egg laying and we’ll have more eggs available every week as the daylight hours get longer.

Speaking of eggs, they’ve been in the news a lot lately. They’re hard to find and prices are sky-high when you can find them. Our eggs have been $4/dozen for years, even as the price of feed has increased. We are considering raising the price of our farm-fresh eggs, but haven’t pulled the trigger yet.

Thanks for reading, and thanks for supporting our small farm. We wish you all the best in 2023!

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Summer, 2020

Life on the farm hasn’t changed much during the strange times were are currently experiencing due to the global COVID-19 pandemic. The routine remains mostly the same as during “normal” times. We are naturally social distanced here on the farm with a lot of open space around us. We are also used to stocking up on groceries and other necessities. Time marches on, animals need feed and care, and farm chores need to get done every day.

Our goat herd is thriving and we had four healthy kids from two does in March. Sadly we lost two kids at birth this year. One was a single and very large and it was a difficult kidding. Mom is doing fine, but the baby didn’t make it through the birth. Another kid was born breech and we think the sac broke before it was born so it did not have enough oxygen. This is the first time we have lost kids and it was just heartbreaking. The four healthy kids (two doelings and two bucklings) are growing quickly and moving on to new forever homes, and their moms are providing us with beautiful milk which is mostly being made into Farmers cheese and Chèvre.

We are grateful that the Farm Stand has been able to remain open during the COVID-related shutdowns. Our egg sales even increased dramatically for a couple of months when eggs were difficult to find in the stores.

We hope you are all doing well and staying healthy during these difficult times.

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Spring 2020, waiting on baby goats

We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of the first Sun Garden Goat kids of 2020. Our second freshener, Marigold is due March 17, St. Patricks Day. After Marigold, we have two first fresheners due in April: Maggie is due April 1 and Marty is due April 7. It’s an exciting time of year, but also stressful. We make sure our goats live a pretty cushy life and we provide optimal nutrition, minerals, fresh water, etc. to keep them healthy, but some times Mother Nature throws curve balls, especially during kidding season. We are keeping our fingers crossed for three healthy kiddings in the next several weeks.

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New Year Approaching

As 2019 winds down, we have a lot of exciting things to look forward to in 2020.

GOATS. We are expecting goat kids in March and April and we can’t wait to meet the new little ones. (See the Kidding Schedule page of the website for more info.) We will be milking the does and plan to use some of that milk to make luxurious, all natural soaps to add to our Farm Stand offerings. And, check out our new logo for our goat herd:

CHICKENS AND EGGS. Our new hens have started laying and the Farm Stand is once again stocked with lots of gorgeous farm-fresh eggs.

PRODUCE. The citrus is plentiful this time of year at the Farm Stand, including: Navel oranges, Satsuma Mandarins, Eureka and Meyer lemons and Ruby Red grapefruit. We also have Hachiya and Fuyu persimmons for another week or two. You can also find walnuts, honey and a few other goodies at the Stand.

Wise Acre Farm wishes you all the best in 2020!

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November at the Farm Stand

We are enjoying the changing seasons and the beautiful weather (although some rain would be nice). We have a wide variety of fall produce at the Farm Stand this time of year. Stop by and you will find: Butternut Squash, Pomegranates, Persimmons (Fuyu and Hachiya), Limes, Pumpkins and Gourds, Honey, Eggs and maybe a few more goodies.

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September, 2019 Happenings

Well, technically September is still a couple of days off, but I wanted to share what’s happening at the farm while I’m sitting at the computer.

First off, let’s talk goats! We still have a few 2019 kids available for sale (see the Kids 2019 page). I am really pleased with our first kidding season. It was definitely a learning experience. We had one premature kid born that had to be raised in the house for several weeks with a lot of special care from us, our neighbors and our wonderful veterinarian. We call him “Tiny” because he was a mere 1.6 lbs at birth. He is thriving now, and will be a life-long resident of Wise Acre Farm.

All of the 2019 kids are healthy and growing, and sweet as can be. We make a point of spending a lot of time with the goats to keep them friendly and easy to handle. Out of eight kids total born this year, we only had two cases of Coccidia both of which were immediately remedied. Other than that, and getting Tiny on his hooves, there have been no health issues with the goats this year (knocking on wood).

The ultimate goal for breeding our goats is milk production. This year, I milked my first goats and made some pretty darn good cheeses with the milk. I’ve got more to learn in this area, and I’m super excited about the possibilities!

I am planning this year’s breedings now – planning to breed in October for March babies. I’m looking into markets for the kids before deciding how many and which does to breed this year. It has been surprisingly difficult to find buyers for the kids this year.

The other main happening on the farm is a cleaning up and retooling of the Farm Stand (see the Farm Stand page for more info). As we head into fall, we are adding fall-inspired merchandise along with our usual farm products. We also have brought in 50 new pullets that will start laying eggs in November so we will have plenty of eggs for our customers soon. Pumpkins will be coming soon too! We love this time of year!!

Wishing you a happy harvest season as we move into September!

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Goat Kids Available

We have four beautiful blue-eyed Nigerian Dwarf Goat kids for sale: two doelings and two bucklings. All are white with gold markings. They are registered with the American Dairy Goat Association and come from excellent milking lines. We test our herd annually for CAE, CL and Johne’s disease and the herd last tested negative in November, 2018.

These kids will make excellent additions to any small dairy herd, as family pets, or as 4H project animals. We spend a lot of time with the kids socializing them to ensure they are easy to handle before they go off to their new homes.

For more information on available kids, please check the goat pages:https://wiseacrefarm.com/sun-garden-goats/