Protocols

Pasture on our farm is a perennial mix of many plant species chosen to fit the nutritional needs of each kind of livestock we raise. We carefully manage our livestock on pasture with the intent to improve the health of our ecosystem year after year. In turn a healthier and balanced soil, diverse plant and wildlife community, and better rainfall infiltration benefit our livestock's overall health, happiness, and nutrition. In general, the way that we manage our livestock on pasture is to control the time they spend on it. If livestock are left on one piece of pasture too long they will cause too much disturbance, killing the plants and causing compaction. We move our livestock to fresh pasture frequently so that they get a consistent supply of fresh forages and so that our pasture does not get damaged by too much impact. 

Organic certification is a guarantee that the food was grown without any synthetic inputs including fertilizers, pesticides, and additives. It also prohibits the use of any GMOs and has standards for crop rotation and cover cropping that benefit soil life and local ecological landscape. 

If you see farms on our website that are not certified organic it does not mean they don't also follow these practices. We prohibit GMOs across the board in the food we carry and only carry products that were grown using sustainable and ecological growing practices. For specifics on how each farm produces their food, click on the farms name and visit their website!

While much of the farms and artisans we work with are certified organic, that is not a requirement for us for a variety of reasons. Many farms choose not to become certified for a variety of reasons including cost, administrative time, and practicality. We have operated our farm using the same standards since we started in 2017, however, only got Certified Naturally Grown in 2021 because we started selling more to small grocery stores. For farms that typically sell directly to the end customer like at farmers markets and CSAs Organic Certification is not always a priority because their practices can be communicated in person. Before we work with a farmer we make sure that they are following sustainable land management practices and organic standards, wether they're certified or not.

Certified Naturally Grown farmers don't use synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, herbicide, or GMOs, just like certified organic farmers. The main difference between CNG and organic is our certification model, which relies on peer inspections, transparency, and direct relationships. The main difference between CNG and Certified Organic standards is that CNG does not allow large corporations to attain certification.