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Vacation Time

Well tomorrow I get on a plane for the long flight back to the states for a little rest, and recuperation and while I am there I will be doing quite  bit of traveling and taking advantage of the opportunity to visit a couple farms that are raising Galloway cattle as well as seeing some operations with a similar set up to what I am planning to do.  While running around the country I will also pick up what will eventually be our farm truck and on top of it all get to see my son graduate from Air Force Tech school.  Over all will be a very busy month (including some time in DC for training).

The truck we are getting is a 2007 Chevrolet 2500HD crew cab 4X4.  Due to the Mn winters we really needed the 4X4 and I wanted a truck big enough to handle the biggest hauling chores as well as have the option to put a plow on it if needed.  . The crew cab was a nice option, originally I was looking for a reg cab but they are almost impossible to find.  When this truck came available from a Government Surplus Auction with only 36K miles it was to hard to pass up!  My son will use the truck while we are stationed overseas and he goes to school at UND (University of North Dakota).

After the graduation (at Sheppard AFB) I will be driving to Parker Kansas to visit Synergistic Acres Farm (http://www.synergisticacres.com/).  Jeff and Laura have been kind enough to agree to show me around their operation.  Synergisitc raises grass fed Galloway, pasture raised chickens as well as pasture raised Big Black pigs, all of which I plan to do, they also raise turkeys on the farm. I really can not do them justice talking about their program so I encourage you to check them out if you are interested!

From there I will be heading to about two hours south of Minneapolis where I will spend a little time with the Hodgson's at Root Prairie Galloways (http://www.rootprairiegalloways.com/).  Root Prairie raises pasture raised Galloway's as well as pasture raised free range chickens.  Root Prairie is one of the locations I am hoping to be able to get some of my initial stock  of Galloway from since they will already be acclimatized to the Minnesota winters and these are animals again breed to do exactly what I am planning on, living mostly off of the land!

The last place I am going to visit will be Blegen Galloways (http://www.blegengalloways.com/index.html) which is located south-west of Fargo, ND, this location is the closest to where we will be setting up the farm and another location I would like to purchase my initial stock from.  Harley really has some great looking animals that produce some real wide bodied cattle.  At the very least I plan on using sperm from their herd sire Moto-Moto to produce some pretty outstanding animals.

Overall this will be my first opportunity to actually see and deal with Galloway cattle in a real time basis, it will be my first time to be able to actually understand the size of the animals we are dealing with to include the Big Blacks.  So in short should be a very educational leave!







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