First Half of 2016 - At A Glance

2016 has been a fantastic year so far for Restoration Acres Farm and the Palma family! We entered into our 3rd year of production this year with plans to increase production in every enterprise, and so we have. We have doubled our egg and pork production, and slightly increased our broilers and turkeys. We are also slowly growing our own beef herd with 2 pregnant cows and 1 young steer who was born on Christmas day, while continuing to care for our land owner's herd as if they were our own. By next Spring/Summer, we will have around 12 whole steers to sell that we raised from birth! That being said, make sure you make plans to fill your freezer with the best 100% grass fed and finished beef around!

Catching Up...Part II

Here we are, over a year after posting "Catching Up...Part 1", and wondering how in the world it has been one whole year since our last post! While the long gap between posts was definitely unintended, it is quite understandable since so much has happened in our lives since last year! Since catching you up on everything that happened in the second half of 2014 and all of 2015 would require a 1000 page book, we have decided to highlight some of the bigger events and touch a little bit on each one.

2014

Found Out We Were Pregnant
On August 30th, 2014 we found out the amazing news that we were pregnant with our first child. What a wonderful surprise! We had been trying for a little while and felt so blessed that God had given us such an incredible gift! There was much going on in our lives at the time, with the big move coming the next day and trying to get everything packed and ready to go. We immediately dropped everything and set up to take this picture;

Catching Up...Part 1

Well...it looks like it's been over 8 months since our last blog post...whoops! We have had many people ask when the next post was going to be and all we could say was "hopefully soon!" Well, better late than never, right? Now that we are established in our new home on the new farm, and now that we have INTERNET (woohoo!), we are hoping that blogging will be a little easier and that we can keep up with it better.

Below is a post that we had written last August but never posted. We decided to go ahead and post it as part 1 of our newest blog since it explains some changes we made and updates from that time period. Enjoy and don't forget to check out part 2 which will have the latest updates on the farm and our lives

"Spring"ing Into Production

Happy May! Spring is here and we couldn't be more relieved and excited! The trees are finally green way up here on the mountaintops, the grass is growing faster than ever, and the warm sun rays are already making a big impression on our white winter skin. Spring is one of the best times of year here on the farm. After going through a hard, cold winter (although we only caught the last of it since we were in Florida), there isn't much that is more beautiful than green grass, blooming trees, and Spring flowers. One of my (Rachel's) favorite things to do in the Spring and Summer is gather fresh wild flowers for the table. My first picking was the other day from a gorgeous Dogwood. We also picked flowers from a Red Bud tree and ate them in a salad...it was delicious! Spring is also the time to kick things into high gear as farmers. One of the amazing things about farming and living off the land is that you are constantly in tune with the seasons. Typically, Winter is the time to relax, enjoy family and friends, sit by the fire and read or write, and reminisce over a (hopefully) successful year. There are still chores to be done and a few animals to keep alive, but that's the general pattern for Winter. As soon as Spring starts to peak it's head around the corner, it's time to start moving! Animals come in, grass needs grazing, shelters need building or fixing, vegetables need planting, and the warm weather and sunshine make for a big appetite and deep sleep at night! Thankfully we decided to start small, especially since this is our first year of farming on our own, so we haven't been overwhelmed by too much of a work load.

And So It Begins...!

As we sit here in our temporary home (aka camper...), the snow and sleet horrendously beating against the door in the 20-something degree weather on March 16th...we reminisce on the past few months. We have now been on the farm for just over a week. Our time traveling around to see family and staying in Florida for two months was absolutely amazing and we are so blessed to have been able to do that. Matt was able to work for his old boss at Heishman Lawn & Gardening doing landscaping pretty much full time for several weeks in Florida, a non-expected though much appreciated source of income. The day we left Florida it was 88 degrees exactly...and we were welcomed to Virginia by a nice warm front that lasted a few days.

Rachel working on the Egg Mobile

We arrived on the farm last Saturday and our first few days here were lovely! It actually got up to 70 degrees one day this week which resulted in a nice long work day accompanied by much welcomed sunburns! Of course, only to be followed by a 30 degree windy day with snow showers. Nonetheless we were grateful for the sunshine and warmth while it lasted. Our first order of business was to start preparing for our first batch of Freedom Ranger chicks which are arriving this Thursday. We were planning on building a brooder from scratch, but when we got to the farm we realized that we could use the current structure that Josh kept his 100 laying hens in for the winter due to the fact that the weather has been so bad (our original idea was to do an outdoor brooder...maybe for the next batch!). It is a simple hoop house structure that he made with pallets, cattle panels, and tarps. It actually kept the hens very warm through the bitter cold winter they had here. But

Family, Friends and Rest

Happy New Year to all of our friends and family! We hope you all enjoyed your Christmas and time with loved ones. We are hanging out down here in good ole' sunny Florida. After several weeks in ice and snow covered Virginia and Pennsylvania, this 70--80 degree weather is quite lovely :) We have yet to make it to the beach, but it is in our plans for the very near future (probably the next few days). We have been longing to be outside and get our hands dirty, so we decided to help Rachel's parents out by doing some yard work. We cut back about 5-10 feet of brush and trees from their neighboring empty lot because it was growing over too much and shading out their garden. It was hard work (we did it all with a hand saw and hedge clippers...no power tools!) but enjoyable nonetheless. We were just glad to be working outdoors again in this beautiful weather. We are just looking for any opportunity to be outside! We miss the farm but are enjoying our time of rest. Now that the holidays are over we will be doing lots of business planning and getting our website up and running so be on the lookout for that! 

A New Chapter In Our Farm Journey

Hello all! Man how time flies! We cannot believe it is November and we are nearing the end of 2013. We finished our apprenticeship at J&L Green Farm on November 15th.

Our friends and fellow workers from
J&L 

 It was hard to say goodbye to the dear friends we made while we were there, but we look forward to being able to continue our friendships with them while living in different states. It has been a great year of learning and hard work with highs and lows of all kinds. We definitely feel very confident to start and run our own farm. As a matter of fact...we did! But before we get into that...let us fill you in on how our Freedom Ranger chickens did :) We processed our birds at 10 weeks old. We ended up with 25 birds...exactly how many we ordered! We had such a fun time raising them and seeing them grow up. They were such beautiful birds with the softest feathers. All 25 of them were extremely healthy with no leg problems, no pneumonia, and they didn't peck at each other causing them to loose feathers and look ugly. We tried our best to spend as much time as we could with them and as a result they were some of the happiest and friendliest chickens! They would always follow us around when we went to them and occasionally would just stand there and let us pet them. They loved when we brought them treats like blemished fruits and veggies, apple cores, leftover pumpkins from carving (pumpkin actually acts as a de-wormer for chickens) and any other leftovers we had. And....not only were they a

Like chickens with our heads cut off...

Wow! What a crazy past couple of months we have had! We have definitely been slacking on blogging, and for that we sincerely appologize. The only thing we can say is that being extremely busy, working 12-15 hour days and not having internet where we live are not a very good combination when you want to blog on a regular basis. We have been in full swing this summer with chicken processing, animal movements, farmer's markets, events and just keeping animals alive and healthy every day. So far we have had around 11 butcher days, and have processed between 150-350 birds each day. That's a lot of chickens! And we still have another 1200 or so chickens to process and several hundred turkeys. We both actually enjoy processing days because we get to be with everyone and even though we're having to kill chickens all day, there is

Rachel cutting off feet, heads and tails

The finished product!

 something satisfying about looking back at the end of the day at all the hard work you've done to not only process these birds but to fully raise them from start to finish and have a healthy, delicious product that your family can enjoy. Both us of have been able to experience each part of the processing.

Rain, Predators, Tag and Bag

Rachel catching broilers and putting them in crates

 It has been awhile since our last blog. We apologize but we have been putting in 14 hours or more a day here at the farm. Sounds like a lot but time flies and we are still learning more and more. The title of this blog post is Rain, Predators, Tag and Bag 

Justin helping catch broilers

Hittin' the Ground Running!

Matt got the feed bin to its destination after going up on one
tire and sliding down a hill side ways, it was a lot heavier
than he thought...

 Well Spring is definitely here at the farm! We are in full swing with animal movement. Everyday we are moving a set of animals. But it's really good to see the animals fully expressing what they were made to do. These couple of weeks were defined by one thing:

One Month of Farming

Moved the ducks onto pasture this week.
The ducks do what we call "the cyclone of death"
when they are scared, you can see them spinning
in circles in this picture.

This week marks our 1 month of being farmers. We still have lots to learn but we are starting to be able to do a lot of things on the farm by ourselves. We have been moving animals around everywhere. Spring is in full swing! Cows, sheep and chickens are moved everyday to new pasture. Ducks are moved every other day. On top of that pigs are still being moved every 10 days.

Third Week at the Farm (Spring is starting!)

We apologize for not getting our blog up on time this week. We have been very busy! Spring is starting on the farm (even though it's still 27 degrees at night) and we are busily preparing all the animals.

Here is our simple electric
fencing set up.

 Working until 10 at night moving chickens out of the hoop houses into their eggmobiles and out on pasture has been normal the past couple days. It actually has been very fun! It's a great time to socialize with everyone. And it's just fun in itself to catch hundreds of chickens at night.

Second week at the farm!

Hey everyone! It has been another great week here at J&L Green Farm. Still very cold…we had about 5 inches of snow last Monday and we are currently at 6 inches and counting! This long Winter thing is a lot more frustrating when you’re spending your whole day outside in it, as opposed to laying on the beach in Florida hearing about it on Facebook J. But Spring is literally almost here. It SHOULD be warmed up to a nice 70 degrees in the next two weeks.

Sheep and cows eating hay right after it
was rolled out

We have learned a lot this week and have experienced several new things. We went to church with the Greens last Sunday and met some great people, and then proceeded to have a party for Allison’s (their daughter) 1^st birthday. We had to skip church this morning because we spent more time at the farm laying hay for all the pigs in preparation for the snow tonight! We learned how to move cows this week. It was a lot easier because you’re setting up fence in an open field as opposed to doing it in the deep thickets of the woods for the pigs. Also the wire for the cow fencing is a lot thinner than pig wire, which makes it easier to manage.

Our First Week At the Farm!

David, Matt, and Kevin just after packing the trailer

Our F-250 7.3 Diesel Truck

Well it finally happened! We took the first step to becoming farmers. We embarked on our long journey from south Florida to north Virginia. We packed our bags right after Justin (Rachel's brother) and Kayla's wedding. We loaded our U-haul trailer to the brim and embarked on our 18 hour road trip to J&L Green Farm. It was supposed to be an 18 hour drive... but after one big hill in North Carolina called Mt. Airy, pulling over 5 times because of an over-heating engine, leaking transmission fluid, a new radiator cap, 4 gallon jugs of coolant, 2 mechanics, 3 hours waiting for the repairs to get done, and pouring down rain it turned out to be a 33 hour trip. But we made it! And that's all that matters. We are here and we are learning how to farm! Rachel and I love it so far and it's so exciting learning all these new things in a hands-on format with personal responsibility. In 8 months we will know how to run a successful sustainable farming business.

Welcome to Matt and Rachel Palma's Farming Blog

     Through our interactions with people about farming many have expressed the desire for us to stay in touch with them. So we decided to create a blog that everyone can view to see what is exactly happening with our farming journey. Visit facebook and this blog regularly to follow us on our day to day adventures as up and coming farmers. We will try and post weekly. Also when we have our own farm this blog will help us and others remember where we came from and how we got there. We hope this blog not only encourages all of you to pursue your dreams and persevere till those dreams are achieved, but that it will also show you the important connection we all have with farming and land stewardship. May this blog inspire, teach, and encourage you while you follow us on our journey. Thanks for being involved with our lives!