First Day of Spring at La Basse Cour and Kortright Handworks!

In late February I was “nominated” for the 10 day farming family challenge by a Facebook – and real life farmer-friend. The challenge is to post pictures from a day in the life of farming that had an impact on me, without any explanation, and to nominate someone to take the challenge, for 10 consecutive days.

Like many farmers, we are on the front lines of climate change. Each season we experience the increasingly dramatic weather events and continue to think about how to adapt. Our baseline farming methods that nurture the soil and increase its organic matter provide us with a great deal of resilience, holding water in the soil structure during drought and enabling it to move through more readily in rainy conditions. By letting the living organisms in the soil do the work of feeding the plant as nature intended, in our small scale we are also supporting the soil and the plants as they act as a carbon sink, converting CO2 in our atmosphere to oxygen and food for us through photosynthesis as the plants and the life of the soil are fed.

Keeping in Touch with La Basse Cour and Kortright Handworks!

Two years ago today I got wind that Belle Terre was up for sale. An historic mansion once owned by Alice T. McLean, daughter of James McLean who was known as the “Copper King” during the Gilded Age, its elegance and charm has withstood with grace the ravages of time, most likely due to her enduring spirit.

She was just a day old when we met, curled up in the wood shavings and her big round brown eyes lifting from her nap after romping with her fellow newborn calf in their stall.

They envision their farm, store, and B&B as fully integrated components of a healthy, working landscape. To that end, they are building partnerships with others who are like-minded.

An increasing number of small farming operations in upstate New York, including La Basse Cour, are raising their fiber animals using regenerative agricultural practices.

Diane Frances lost her heart to this sweet farm in 1996 while on a scouting mission to find a second home close to her parents, thinking she might one day want to retire up to the country.