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Happy Holidays!!   It seems like just yesterday we were installing all the fencing and working hard to set up for the summer. The joy of spring time fence walking, lambing and piglets squealing has evolved into taking down fences, picking up waterlines and hunkering down for the winter. As a livestock farm, we have births of pigs and cattle year round, but our lambs, goats birth in the spring and we are in the process of harvesting many of them now. This is to remind you that your December meat share will be distributed:

Bullet Points for the speed readers:

• Turkey HELL (Warning it is LONG but detailed about challenges in processing)
• Cattle births
• Winter Preparations on the farm
• Recipes

We grow and harvest livestock. That is our passion, our lives mission and blessedly our job. We work hard to make sure each species is cared for, loved, and raised with respect for both the animal and the land it occupies. Our harvest practices involve loading the animals onto our trailer and driving them to one of the two humane, USDA slaughterhouses that we use. We are used to the practice, we ensure that our harvest homes do not use holding pens or abuse the animals in any way and we work hard to make sure the stress on our animals is as minimal as possible by working to make sure they are comfortable in transit and little time is spent between arrival at the slaughterhouse and actual harvest.

Fall is here in full glory. Days are getting shorter and nights are getting longer. We have passed the fall equinox and it is all downhill from here until Dec 21^st. The sunrises are suddenly surprisingly late (6:15!!) and sunsets too early.  We continue to celebrate the seasons and enjoy our connections with our animals. We have had several new calves and piglet litters in the last few weeks. The turkeys are growing well and our chickens are loving the rain because of all the bugs it brings out. This is to remind you

Bullet Points – But PLEASE skim the text this month – there are several important administrative items this month

• Talking Turkey
• Chestnut Farms on TV
• Summer Share Cycle ENDS in Nov
• Save Family Farms!!
• OPEN Barn Change
• Lamb Harvest
• Cooking with

Talking Turkey: Thank you so much for your turkey orders!! We sold out again by the end of September. This is a tribute to the amazing quality of our fresh, fabulous birds that have a wonderful life in the sun and the fields and then grace the Thanksgiving table. You can view the birds on our website – and their very cool watering system. We will be confirming turkey orders, kind and size and collecting money for the turkeys at distribution tomorrow. The broadbreasted white turkeys are $75 and the Heritage (Narragansett) turkeys are $100. We would really appreciate a separate check or cash for the turkeys as we are trying to pay careful attention to our own numbers. Turkeys are not cheap; they are $5.76 (broadbreasted white) or $12.79 (heritage) as day old hatchlings. Then we feed and water them for six months. Right now (October) they are eating 1.5 TONS of turkey grain every four to five days – plus all the bugs, worms and grass they want. A ton of turkey grain is $479.   Each turkey is $12 to process. There is the occasional loss of turkeys as babies (they like to sit on and squish each other) as well as the predator loss (so far 0 this year!!). Thank you so much for helping us track the turkey numbers by writing a separate check. The turkeys will be distributed separately from the November meat shares, usually the weekend before Thanksgiving. However, it is dependent upon our slaughter schedule and you WILL receive an email reminder and the delivery schedule will be posted on the website.