Mary Combs

This topic needs a bit of introduction - I started raising Native Milking Shorthorns in 2016. This is a rare breed with some outstanding characteristics for homesteaders and I made it my project to create a Landrace of Native MS that are A2/A2 and Homozygous polled. The milk proteins gene comes in several varieties but basically, A1 milk causes a lot of allergy issues, A2 milk not so much. To get A2 milk requires 2 A2 genes. If a cow has 1x A2 gene and 1x A1 gene, the milk will give a mixture of A1 and A2 proteins. To know what genes your cow has, means genetic testing. I use UD Davis genetics lab to get this information. The other characteristic that I am selectively breeding for, is for polled cattle. I don't want horns in my herd for a variety of reasons - mostly to do with nearly losing a eye a few times.

Until a few weeks ago, I was only interested in whether polled animal was heterozygous polled (P/H) or homozygous polled (P/P). Obviously in my project I want to consolidate my breeding program on homozygous polled - though not to the exclusion of all the other great characteristics this breed exhibits. I had a bit of a revelation when the tests from my spring calves came back - one of those calves is homozygous polled, but has two different types of polled gene. I was previously oblivious to the fact that 'polled genes' come in two different flavors. The net effect is the same in that homozygous polled means the cow has no horned gene to give to its babies. When I initially started my project, UCD test results showed only polled versus horned, its only in the last two or three years they started reporting on which polled gene the animal carried.

To some extent, this is an academic discussion - one type of polled doesn't win over the other type of polled - but the origin of the gene comes from two different mutations in separate populations. So all my cattle until 2024 arose from Cantagree and JbarJ bloodlines - and the polled gene contributed from these sources were 100% Pf - that is, all my animals that carried the polled gene, arose from the Friesian mutation/population. Since then, I've bred several animals from the Eionmor Port-O-Call NP bull. His polled gene is of the Celtic variety. So I now have several animals that carry the Pc gene and one special heifer that is homozygous polled with a mix of the two polled genes. Some may find this a boring discussion, but discovering this, I found quite interesting.

Here is the explanation quoted directly from the UC Davis website:

"From the time when livestock was first domesticated, modifications to the wild types have been selected both for animal husbandry and aesthetic reasons. Unique and large horns define cattle breeds such as Texas Longhorn, Highland Cattle, and Ankole Watusi. However, in modern times many cattle are maintained in more crowded conditions such as barns and small fenced pastures where polled phenotypes are more desirable for both beef and dairy breeds.

Recently, candidate mutations associated with polled phenotype in European breeds of cattle were found. There are 2 independent origins of polled, one found in Holstein-Friesian and Jersey breeds (Pf), the other in many European breeds of Celtic origin (Pc) such as Angus, Blonde d’Aquitaine, Dexter, Limousin, Charolais, and Hereford, among others. Investigation of the polled mutation in Brahman cattle revealed the segregation of the Celtic polled variant (Pc) in the breed. Polledness is dominant; a polled animal can have one or two copies of the polled alleles. All offspring of a homozygous polled bull (2 of the same polled allele, Pc/Pc or Pf/Pf) will be polled. Additionally, offspring with one copy of each of the polled alleles (Pc/Pf, compound heterozygous) will also be polled. Genetic testing is a cost-effective means to determine if a polled animal has 1 or 2 copies of the polled alleles.

Testing for the polled gene assists breeders in selecting cattle that have 2 copies of Polled gene."

I spent a decade of my life with a Staffordshire Bull Terrier. She was smart - incredibly smart - but took quite a lot of training and time to learn to learn to trust spending any time confined. She had a back story that accounts for that, she came from a rescue facility that takes in dogs brought in by the police. In her case, she spent three days confined in a locked apartment with the body of her murdered previous owner. She had night terrors for the first year that she was with me, and needed comforting in the middle of every night. I guess after a year she started feeling safe and well loved and her night terrors decreased in frequency over time. She was up for anything from endless ball tosses, to long walks off lead, poking her nose in every bush (but not roaming so far that I was out of her sight), to watching me garden. She was the perfect family holiday dog, willing to nap cuddled up with any family member. I can’t imagine a better companion. On the other hand, I have owned a Manchester Terrier and my tenant owns a Rat Terrier, and I would not have either breed on my farm if I had any say in the choice. They just can’t help themselves when it comes to wandering / ‘exploring’. That rat terrier is fast and can go missing in the blink of an eye. Coming back when called seems to depend on whether she thinks there is anything in it for her. She has been picked up on the Highway several times. She will also kill anything she can catch from prairie dogs, to garter snakes, to quail to young game birds. Definitely stay away from the small hyperactive terriers.

Hi John

Here are some additional things to think about.

We are in resilience mode at the farm and in this region of North Idaho generally. The region has become a homesteader destination with many people preparing to survive whatever comes next in the current crazy situation the US finds itself in. We are in about as safe a location and community setting as is likely to be available over the next few years, and that should be an equally attractive feature as the actual business opportunity itself.

Anyone taking up this opportunity needs to come prepared to work at being self-sufficient rather than thinking there will be 'training' available. We are about 3.5 hours drive from Wheaton Labs for anyone wanting to top up on their training. The residents on the farm are all learning together - albeit, I have 2 PDCs and have been developing permaculture features on this farm for 10 years. Applicants need to already have the right to live and work in the US and must not be legally precluded from exercising their 2nd amendment rights (rural area = predators).

Raw Milk dairying does carry risks and liabilities that can be mitigated through scrupulous hygiene. The business opportunity would favor someone who is already well familiar with dairy cows - even if that is conventional rather than raw milk production. I operate a 'closed herd', albeit I would consider buying in a calf to obtain fresh genetics - but never an adult. We already have a biosecurity program in place that periodically tests for cattle diseases.

For anyone contemplating making the change from conventional to Raw Milk in Idaho state, some key references to read up on would include:

https://www.rawmilkinstitute.org/purpose

https://agri.idaho.gov/main/animals/dairy-bureau/raw-milk/

https://www.today.com/food/what-a2-milk-everything-you-need-know-today-t213875

Thank you Karen. So far no one has come forward to talk about doing this micro-dairy business.

Hopefully someone will find this to be of interest to them!

It must have been tree kale - the description sounds about right. I'm trying to start patches of perennials that I can cut for fodder for the cattle if we get into another drought scenario where hay becomes unobtainable. Thanks for your suggestions!

Hi All

A few years back I saw reference to an uncommon tall green leafy plant that could be used for livestock fodder. I wanted to look it up again now to see if it would fit a niche area I've got. All I can remember about it is that it grew over head high and had a double barreled name. Can anyone suggest the name of what I had been looking at? Thank! Mary

My farm just built its first hugelbed and the plan is to spend a lot of time on building more rather than on burn piles.

How about asking everyone for a picture(s) of their hugelbeds and a list of the plants they have grown on them. 'The March of the Hugels'.....


Edit - we have our farm garden laid out conventionally - and it looks like a vegetable garden. We may use some hugels for conventional plantings, but mostly I plan to plant perennials that might not be recognizable as food patches.

University of Michigan just published a paper internationally concluding "Fruits and vegetables grown in urban farms and gardens have a carbon footprint that is, on average, six times greater than conventionally grown produce." If people start believing the regulators could start looking at home grown produce with 'climate change' in mind, having access to a pictorial on hugel techniques and associated perennial edible, might be appealing.

Background - I breed and raise a rare breed of dual purpose cattle - the Native Milking Shorthorn. This breed has a special section within the American Milking Shorthorn herdbook. It was set up in the 1990's by a group of Shorthorn breeders who were concern at the amount of outcrossing that had taken place over the years - beef breeders outcrossing to other beef breeds and dairy breeders outcrossing to other dairy breeds with the goal of 'improving' the Shorthorn breed. Meanwhile, the original breed type was being diluted to the point that type was on the verge of extinction. The breed is still classified by the Livestock Conservancy as 'threatened'. The specification for the Native Milking Shorthorn is that all points of its pedigree must trace back to the original 1822 Coates herdbook - essentially stock originally imported from England and early generations from that stock.

The Native breed is highly grass efficient, compliant, low key and friendly. I have been breeding for several years and this year will have enough lactating cows to establish as a certified raw milk dairy. I am looking for someone who might want to come live on my farm and make a business of selling raw milk and raw milk products. This would essentially be an agricultural tenancy. You wouldn't own the land or the animals - which lowers the business risk for someone keen on dairying.

We have over 100 acres and have been slowly implementing permaculture features and improving pasture. There is a large farm garden, shared with two other tenants. There is lots of opportunity for other homesteading type activities - poultry, rabbits, mushroom growing, etc. You would need to have your own RV, but a pad, water, and electric is available. Also available are two milking machines, barns and other equipment.

My interest is in breeding, expanding and promoting the breed. But its a shame for these lovely cows to not be employed in producing clean, nutritious raw milk for the community. Raw milk in the Idaho Panhandle is selling for $15+ per gallon and there seems to be a good market for product. In Idaho, raw milk produced under an Idaho license can be sold retail as well as direct to the consumer.

Applicants MUST be experienced in dairy production, love cows and have the desire to start up and run your own business. Might suit a small homeschooling family as there is a fantastic homeschooling network in this area.

Located north of Saint Maries Idaho.

If interested, send an email to mary.combs@btopenworld.com

Carla Burke wrote:pour Mary - thank you for that! I didn't know that, about the bentonite (I tend to see the stuff primarily from the perspective of a herbalist & creator of hygiene and skin care products, lol).
As far as the top of the dam, if we can stop this leak, my hope is to clear it, for use as a safe path to the other side. The dam side is much closer to the house, and it would be great to have easy access from the deck. Foraging on that side of the pond would be much better, if the hike to & from it wasn't so prohibitive to my painful knees.

Hi Carla - a serious consideration - planners and the environment agency really do not like tall dams unless they are planned, permitted and built under the supervision of an engineer. Much as we want to be free of bureaucracy, there is a pretty good reason for that rule. The deeper your pond gets, the more water will pour downstream in the event of a failure of the dam. The fact that you have a seep already, argues for the dam not being perhaps as strong as you imagine. What is downhill of you? What is going to get damaged, killed or washed away if your dam fails? Regardless of someone before you having built it, when you bought the property, you inherited the liability for that pond, etc. My bet is that the previous owner just bulldozed a dyke and called it a dam, without having properly constructed it from the bottom up - track rolling every 6 inches and having a solid clay core. The more water pressure you put behind that structure, the more pressure will be exerted at all levels. if it should fail, not only could bad things happen downstream, but you will have lost all your dam construction material.

My property has a 'cow pond' that I'm sure was constructed much as I describe above. At one point our seller owned a bull dozer and there is evidence all over the farm of where he just had to find a use for that tool. As for our cow pond - it is spring-fed, so I don't plan on messing with it at all (springs and seeps tend to go their own way if messed with). I would be surprised if he even scraped the grass off the future dam site before starting to throw up the dam / berm. It leaks at about the same rate that the spring supplies water - so our pond depth only varies by 12 - 18" over the year.  What it does do is leak from under the dam. We have taken advantage (permaculture style) of that leak by situating our main farm garden below that dam. We therefore get sub-irrigation for a couple months going into summer. I am now wanting to bury wood and biochar under the garden beds to try to capture water in the Spring and extend that sub-irrigation effect through the whole Summer.

I have a new pond that we need to seal at the bottom, so I did some research on bentonite. There are two types of bentonite - calcium bentonite (does not swell and can be easily found and is significantly cheaper than sodium bentonite, which does swell, is a specialist product (sold to landscapers and pond builders) and is significantly more expensive than calcium bentonite.

If I had a seep and knew where it was on the inside, I’d be tempted to pin a couple of burlap feed sacks over the area and try to work with sodium bentonite to slow the flow. A slow seep will tend to heal itself with the silt and clay that gets pulled into the seep.

Finally, from your pictures, you seem to have a lot of woody bushes or saplings started growing on your dam. Those will break down the integrity of your dam over time.

I would plant shallow rooted plants and cut out the woody stems. Clumping bamboo does a good job of holding soil and stabilising a surface. I would plant it on the outside slope of the dam.