​How long have you been farming and how did you get into it? 

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Sid has been a lifelong farmer; he grew up on a Heffer farm and when he was in his 20s he bought himself a beef herd, then things in life changed, and he had to leave it. When we moved up here, this house was sitting vacant for many years, and he always used to say, “someday we’re going to have that place”. Prices were crazy, and I was like, “there’s no way”. Sid’s a risk taker, he’s the smartest person I know, and can make anything work, and he has turned this place around from vacant, overgrown brush to what it is today. 

 

Were you excited about the idea of farming?

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Me, no - ha! It is a very gratifying job... I mean Sid would rather be here than anywhere. It’s his passion and this is his dream. If he never had to leave this driveway again, he’d be happy as a clam. I just don’t know how he does it, he works 40 hours a week and then comes home and puts in another 20+. Some days you just pray for rain because you know we just don’t stop. 

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What can we expect to find on your farm?

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We have beef cattle, we are back up to 60 or 70 beef cattle; we’ve got 300 laying birds; 25-30 meat ducks; 15-20 pigs and piglets, we breed the pigs; lambs, we try to butcher 6 lambs a year; we just butchered 25 turkeys; and we also have our meat chickens, we do about 150 in a summer. That usually holds us over for the winter and we start over when April comes around. 

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Everything is raised humanely – I mean these guys are more spoiled than we are. We are not classified as organic and we only give antibiotics if the animals are really sick. While they’re mostly grassfed, we do give them grain because you need fat on your animals and it’s also a great treat for them.

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We also offer Christmas trees, wreaths, propane, and seafood on a pre-order basis. Pick up for seafood is available weekly in the summer and every other week in the winter, order by Thursday for a Saturday delivery.

 

Do you grow any vegetables?​

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Just your regular garden vegetables, mostly for home use, we’ll put a tomato out or something in the summer so people can have them on their burger, but we actually really just like to send people to Daughters 5, the Co-op, or up to Drinkwine’s.

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Do you guys do your butchering on the farm?​

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No, not yet. Everything has to be USDA-inspected butchered and processed. It’s the hardest thing, to find a butchering spot and to have to travel to get it butchered. It is tough. We are currently going to Vermont for processing at Locust Grove in Argyle. 

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How does your day-to-day change with each season?​

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You’re at the mercy of mother nature pretty much, your day starts by her – she can help you or she can kill ya. I mean one year, with all that rain, she killed us… After the rain, we didn’t have enough hay to feed all winter. So, we had to sell our cows. It was devastating - after you raise these animals you become attached. Now that we had a better year, we are adding to our herd. We’re very fortunate that we have neighbors who are amazing, and they let us hay all their land, and we lease 125 acres from joining property next to us. So, we can pasture more animals. Your days start early and sometimes end late.

 

Summers are very busy, ‘cause Sid does the hay and needs 3 days of nice weather to get hay done, so he's gotta get up one day to mow it, the next day to ted it, and then rake it, and then bail it, so it’s a lot of planning. The hay is all for the animals. And this year, since we didn’t get any rain we didn’t get second cut in, but thankfully we have enough from last year that we should be okay through the winter and we have a lot of wrapped bails as well.

 

What do you love most about farming and what are your biggest challenges?

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The happiness from the community. We had a contract with the school, and the little kids would come in to see all the animals and they're always so happy. We had a contract for 2 years, through Clinton, Essex and Warren County BOCES and CVES from Plattsburgh, providing meat for schools from Ticonderoga all the way up to Plattsburgh and Peru. We had a good profit margin on it, but then when the prices went through the roof we just couldn’t compete, they could go to US Foods or SISCO and it’s not farm fresh like they want the kids to have but I can’t sell the beef for less than I pay for it. That’s why if we ever get to expand, we’d love to have a processing area on this farm. Still take it to get USDA killed and stamped but bring it back and cut it up ourselves, so that’s our next step - it has to be - if we want to keep growing. 

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And, the local support is actually amazing, that’s probably more gratifying than anything – you’re really providing for the community. And I mean we’re so lucky, because most places would shut their business down, because we live in a tiny community in Putnam and all the summer people are gone, but the support from the locals is amazing – even the people who don’t come here and just go to the Co-op, they’re dedicated and they’re faithful, they really are. 

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And, the challenges, well the weather is our biggest challenge, and the price of beef right now is a challenge. Because a lot of people, think well I can go to Walmart and buy meet for 8 dollars/lb and I have to tell them well, this is a totally different ballgame than Walmart. I mean, for example, we have a guy who raises beef the same way that we do, and if we ever fall short of a cow, we can go to him and buy one. So, we needed a burger cow, we went up to this guy’s farm, and he’s got beautiful animals - this is a beautiful animal - and we bought it for $3,000. Last year at this time, we were buying beef for maybe $1 to $1.20/lb on the hoof, as in the animal standing there alive, now it’s over $2.50/lb. Then, I have to take it to the processer, get it processed. That was $1900. So, I’m $4,900 into this animal, and that’s not even counting the gas it takes to go to the butcher and get the cow, and I haven’t even put it in the store yet! So, if you’re aiming for an average of $9/lb just to break even, it’s tough and I mean – nobody works for free. So right now, the market for beef just blows my mind. 

 

How much meat do you typically process in a year?

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We do probably 50-55 head of beef a year; 20-25 pigs; 20 ducks; all the meat chickens; and we buy the turkeys at 7-8 weeks because the mortality rate is so high when they’re babies, so we buy them and finish them off right up until just before Thanksgiving. 

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How long have you been selling your products through the Ticonderoga Food Co-op? Where else can we find your products?

 

Since we started in 2018, and we really took off during COVID, when Walmart started running out of meat and people didn’t know what to do. We only sell our meat in our store and at the Co-op.

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How is the Ticonderoga Food Co-op important to your operation? 

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They’re amazing, they push our products to a lot of people and they’re fabulous people to work with. They’re supportive, I mean if you want to try something different, they’re always there to help. Alana’s great, and I deal with Dawn a lot. They’re always grateful and they understand. They’re a great Co-op - I would support them through thick and thin. I just want to thank them all for all their support and share our gratefulness that they’re there. 

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