ROADS END RANCH

2015 RECAP
calebthomasanderson@gmail.com 218-393-7677 1/3/2016

Hello there, I hope everyone had a great holiday season. Also, I hope youve been enjoying meat from our farm
slow cooked roasts on cold Sunday afternoons and such. This letter is a recap of the year to help you know
where your food came from.

The most exciting thing on the farm this year was that this was our first year using a fully functional rotational
grazing system. First thing in the spring we installed 1800 of above ground 1 water line with valves offering wa-
ter hookup for each paddock. This completed our rotational grazing infrastructure, which allowed us all season to
offer rest periods for forage regrowth in each pasture. The photo to the right shows Celia standing in a paddock
that was just finished grazing. The paddock left of her with tall grass is where the cattle were just being turned in
that day.
Sheep productivity was without doubt the most unsuccessful
aspect of the farm this year. We lambed in April/May. While
successful ewe flocks average 2 lambs per ewe, we only aver-
aged 1.1 lamb per ewe. There are a few things we will work on
to improve this. One of which will be culling several underper-
forming ewes. They have an appointment to be made into mut-
ton burger later this month. We saved several ewe lambs to re-
place them as breeding stock. Hopefully this will help things im-
prove over time. Ewe lambs generally give single lambs their first year so we wont see results for a couple
years. Patience patience.

This was our first year calving. With just three bred cows this was sort of a trial run. Each of them bore a healthy
calf unassisted so we were blessed with beginners luck. Just enough luck to sucker us in. We will calve a few
more cows this spring.
So, another year down. Lots of small successes with just as many frustra-
tions: nothing unbearable. At a Christmas party last week I was asked what
our goal is with the farm. Ive thought about this a bit and I think the goal is
simply to produce healthy, good tasting, environmentally favorable food and
to do so profitably. Also, Ive heard that something like $0.80 per dollar spent
at a small local business gets recirculated in the community as opposed to
$0.37 per dollar spent at a large retail chain. So, another goal is to produce a
product that benefits the community beyond myself and the beef customer
our neighbors as well.

Thanks for your support. Please complete our online survey to help us achieve our goal
(see link in email). Hope to hear from you next year. The next page is just a few photos
from the year. Thank you!
Cattle turned into a new paddock.

Brooke got a horse. The horse chases the sheep for

sport, which isnt good. Maybe shell deter wolves.

Finally poured the slab in the pole barn. Ooooh, nice.

Fritz met a porcupine. No friendship was formed.

Celia met a sheep. A friendship was formed.dont We bought these awesome 24 freestanding corral panels. Its
get too attached. amazing nobody got hurt with the previous rag tag collection of
corral equipment.