Life on the farm is exciting!! We have had a second litter of piglets - all are doing well and our future bacon looks great!! Our last litter should emerge near the end of April - At that point we will have over 100 piglets on our farm - the sows are wonderful moms - we build pens for them to give birth in or we use stalls rather than metal farrowing crates favored by commercial growers. The farrowing crates do not allow the mother to roll over or move under the theor that she will be less likely to roll onto her piglets. We belive that playing with and patting our pigs, rubbing bellies during labor and making sure they have a comfortable bed of hay or straw is more effective. While we have had an occasional mortality either in birth or shortly after, the vast majority of our piglets grow up healthy, happy and like their mothers able to move around at will.

We have also had a number of sheep being born - they are doing well with their moms - we are working toward having birthing stalls for the sheep, but right now they give birth in the pens with the mothers - the future of our lamb chops also looks great. The sheep are clearly all ready for spring and would love to be out on the pasture eating fresh green grass. Unfortunately, they must make do with the hay that we feed from a local farm. We do offer our sheep a bit of grain to make sure they remember the grain bucket (great for moving them from pasture to pasture) and to provide essential vitamins and minerals. Like our pigs we use only Poulin grain - 100% natural grain - NO animal by-products

We are excited to have been featured on the front page of the Springfield Repbublican last Monday. We are thrilled to be part of the growing buy local movement. We are also thrilled to be part of a community that connects people to local agriculutre and supports and celebrates our New England agricultural heritage.

In addition, we would like to make you aware of the plight of our neighbors. We live on probably the last street in MA with two dairy farms - one at each end of the road. Our neighbors struggle to afford to continue to farm. One of our neighbors will be going out of business this spring. We have learned that farming in general and dairy farming in particular is economically difficult - it is the only industry where people take off farm jobs to be able to continute to practice farming. No one would ever expect a lawyer to make burgers to be able to afford to practice law nor a doctor to drive a truck in order to have enough money to keep a medical office open, yet in New England we expect this of our dairy farmers. Current milk prices are where they were in 1973, yet nothing else remains the same price. Our dairy farmers are competing with factory farms that milk 3000 to 10,000 cows - economies of scale that are just not possible in New England. Interstingly, every other state in New England has offered a direct payment to dairy farmers this year to compensate for the low milk prices. The MA government has made some noises about supporting dairy farms, yet nothing has been forthcoming. My friends and neighbors who preserve hundreds of acres of open space through their efforts as dairy farmers are unable to afford to buy corn for spring planting. The economic situation is dire. Please, contact your state Senator and Representative to let them know how very important this is.

Once a farmer plants houses in the field, it can never be tilled again.

On another interesting public policy note, Time magazine ran an article on buying local. The article is entitled Eating Better than Organic - for some fascinating reading. We certainly agree with the points in the article, but do belive it is possible to raise local food in the northeast without chemicals. We certainly do with our animals and we plant a large family garden each spring using all organic methods. It is labor intensive, though and that goes back to some of the challenges facing my neighbors the dairy farmers.

I cannot emphasize what a difference your support of local farms like ours makes. You help preserve land and the traditions of farming each month.

Thanks again for supporting local farms.

Kim Denney
Chestnut Farms