Homepage - 1dr Acres Farm

WELCOME TO OUR FARM

We are a diversified, forage-based livestock operation managing two hundred and thirty acres in the Driftless Area of southwest Wisconsin. We (Allen and Cherrie) are first generation farmers who began operating the farm together in 2015, where we breed Norwegian Fjord Horses, meat goats, meat sheep, and a small flock of layer hens, all protected by livestock guardian dogs .

We breed Norwegian Fjords through a happy accident, but are deeply committed to the breed and its preservation. When she was twelve years old, Cherrie wanted a Belgian to ride, drive and use for draft work, but was informed that they eat too much and was instructed to purchase something with lower caloric needs. Living in Stoughton, Wisconsin at the time, which has a deep Norwegian heritage, she was drawn to the small, versatile, hardy farm horse of western Norway, the Norwegian Fjord. She found a local breeder with a large selection, chose a mare that had a beautifully smooth ride, chose a stallion to breed her, and brought home her first pregnant mare in 1991. Her first stallion was born in 1992 and she has been breeding Fjords ever since.

Cherrie first got goats when farming in Kansas in 2008, and she brought them back to Wisconsin to put their brush-munching proclivities to use against the aggressive woody vegetation that she and many other ecologists have fought with cutting, herbiciding, and burning. The goat herd served as a part of Cherrie’s research for her Masters in Agroecology. Allen milked Nubians in West Virginia prior to moving to Wisconsin, and some of those goats and their guardian dogs joined the herd that Cherrie had produced.

Cherrie first got sheep and LGDs in 2001, had multiple flocks of different breeds and mixes over the years, and the current flock were originally selected to train our English Shepherd herding dog and to mow our 3.5 acres of lawn. We have a mix of breeds, with selection for meaty hair-types that need no interventions to be healthy and productive.

The goat herd and sheep flock have been selected for low-input management on forage and brush diets and are raised on a combination of lawn and silvopasture, grain-free, and regeneratively. The livestock guardian dogs are bred for on-farm use to protect the goats and sheep from predators.

In addition to the commercial activities the farm is also our home where we have many other pursuits including research, gardening, herbology, and making lambsagna (lamb lasagna, and other seasonally-appropriate lamb-based cuisine), cheese, beer and preserved functional foods.

Welcome!

Norwegian Fjord Horses

Cherrie started breeding Fjord horses in 1991, with one mare and we now have the largest registered breeding herd in the country with twenty to twenty-five broodmares, five to seven stallions and we produce around twenty to twenty-five registered Fjord foals a year. Our foals are raised continually in a herd where they can develop in a natural herd setting. Living on a pasture of diverse and nutrient-dense forages, they learn to eat and balance their diet from their mothers and the rest of the herd, setting them up with the epigenetic programming for a lifetime of health for them and their potential future offspring. The hilly topography of our farm, the freedom to gallop anytime and lots of other foals to play with develops healthy joints, strong dense bones, and excellent body awareness and control in our foals. The herd life produces socially-balanced individuals and the daily human interaction that our foals receive primes them for great future relationships with their new humans. The foals live with small livestock underfoot (goats, sheep, chickens, donkeys) and our livestock guardian dogs teach the foals to not chase or play with those smaller creatures, which translates to care around children and makes them adaptable to having any of those species as a companion in a future home.

See our available horses.

Pictured above (l-r): Stallions Mathis, Rurik, Orven, Ragnvald

Fjord Mentoring

Cherrie mentors owners of our foals with her extensive experience as a breeder and manager of over 150 Fjords, from her formal University education in wildlife ecology, agroecology, livestock management, biomedical sciences, nutrition, veterinary research, parasitology, pasture management, soil science and fertility, immunology, genetics, animal behavior, equine reproduction, statistics, molecular biology, animal welfare, forages, etc, and from her self-taught knowledge that wasn’t available through the University; organic livestock management, successful grazing of easy-keeper equines, managing a natural-breeding herd of horses, selection for desirable complex traits, functional conformation, Fjord breed standard, variation within the breed, dung beetles, transfaunation, holistic management of pests, temperament assessments, livestock guardian dogs, small ruminants on pasture, multi-species grazing, cost-share programs for fencing and farm infrastructure, autohemotherapy, plant phytochemistry’s relationships with health, health condition management, health promotion, etc. Cherrie makes time for questions on any of these topics to educate and help the owners of our Fjords.

Goats

Our herd of one hundred-fifty browsing, grain-free, low-input meat goats spend the summer in our ninety-five acres of silvopasture. This was degraded woodland that we thinned and are using the goats to organically convert the resultant brush to forbs and grasses as an understory for an oak-based savanna.

Our goats are mixed-breed with a high proportion Kiko and Spanish, selected for the meaty body structure that comes from the Boer, Savanna, Myotonic, and for intervention-free management (those we retain require no deworming, hoof trimming, assistance kidding, assistance raising all kids, flushing for twinning, nor supplemental energy/protein beyond what their silvopasture provides in summer and diverse baleage provides in winter).

We breed in late December and January to allow for on-pasture kidding in May and June. At present the bucklings are sold off at auction for meat, with some bucklings being retained for assessment as future breeding bucks, some of which are sold every year to other breeders. Doelings are being retained until our herd has reached is growth goal and are not available for purchase at this time.

The livestock guardian dog here is a Bulgarian Karakachan.

Sheep

Our flock of one hundred rotationally-grazed, grain-free, low-input meat sheep spend the summer mowing our lawn, mowing weeds in the winter lots, or grazing in our ninety-five acre silvopasture. We breed in late December and January to allow for on-pasture lambing in May and June. They are mixed-breed, consisting of predominantly Katahdin, St. Croix and Dorper hair sheep for parasite-resistance and shedding hair coats, with a mix of Texel, Babydoll and Suffolk for more meat, and Icelandic, Polypay and Shetland for maternal traits and natural twinning. Those that stay are intervention-free individuals, for all the same traits we select in our meat goats.

At present, the ram lambs are sold off at auction for meat or eaten on the farm, with some ram lambs being retained for assessment as future breeding rams, some of which are sold every year to other breeders. Ewes are being retained until our flock has reached is growth goal and are not available for purchase at this time.

Educational Materials

Cherrie gives lectures, webinars, interviews, presentations, hosts pasture walks and puts together educational materials every year, based on her experience and formal education.

Photo by Greg Galbraith

Topics with links will be posted soon.

GALLERY

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