Sage Coyote Farms, Tierra Amarilla, New Mexico, April 19-20,2016

As many of you know my son and daughter-in-law are eking out a living on about 360 acres of land in Northern New Mexico near Tierra Amarilla.  The "farm ", as Gayle, my daughter-in-law calls it, is located about 12 miles from the  New Mexico Highway  84 turnoff to New Mexico 112 and about 3 miles from El Vado Dam and Lake.  The nearest grocery store is 12 miles out to the main road (84) and another 15 miles to Chama, New Mexico.  Still, to me, it is a little slice of heaven and I love visiting the farm.  It is so quiet and and you can see for miles and miles.

We had a great dinner at the High Country, with Conlan and Gayle  which is one of the hot spots in Chama.  As always the food, especially the Mexican food, was very good.  The next day we headed over to the farm.

Since I last visited last October, the farm has grown slightly and there have been some good changes. The farm is growing.  All but three of the pigs have grown up and have ended up on dinner plates (down from about 20) ; the Devon cows have thrown a few calves, and the Yak herd has grown  from three to nearly 20 and there are several new calves which are so much fun to watch.

Mom and new calf.

 The moms are still protective of the new borns, so I couldn't get much closer.  These photos are taken with my telephoto lens.

This is Mr. Seven.  He is the main bull (daddy) of the Yak calves. Pavi, the black and white yak at the top of the photo is still too young to breed.  He is not quite two years old. I first met him when he was only a few months old.

The organic gardening has been very successful with garlic and special potatoes, carrots, and beets as the main crops.  The potatoes, beets, carrots are stored in the root cellar  during the winter.

The garlic was planted last fall and thrived during the winter and will be ready for the early farmers markets is Los Alamos near Santa Fe come May. Demand for out exceed production.  

My visit this time was all too short.  The weather was not cooperating and we had to stay in an RV park in Charma because the farm was really muddy ("greasy" as my son calls it) and I was afraid we would get stuck. The day before we arrived they had almost 12' of snow and lost power.  Their power was out for over 2 1/2 days.  Fortunately, they do have a generator to keep the freezers of meat cold which  they sell at the markets.

Today, the weather was perfect. Clear skies with a few puffy clouds rolling by and an occasional breeze.  Gayle fixed a supper of elk, farm raised pork, roasted carrots, and new potato salad, with a scrumptious desert of home made chocolate cake.  Ymm.  After supper we lounged around watching the Yaks as they meandered down from the ridge to the pond.

Gayle, Conlan, and Joel watching the Yaks meander down to the pond. You can part of the garlic crop towards the bottom of the photo.

I wandered around checking out the chickens and pigs and yaks.  (I did snag a dozen of fresh eggs.  Nothing taste better than fresh eggs!)

 There is always, always, work to do. Conlan and Gayle are fixing the electric fence to keep the pigs in.

These are a special breed of pigs.  They only get about 150 ponds at the most.  They are grazers unlike most pigs.  But these are the last of them. Gayle and Conlan have decided they take too much pasture for the amount of meat they produce.

 This time I didn't hike down to the lower pastures to find the Devon cows.  It was just too muddy and I was really enjoying watching the new Yak calves which were only two weeks old.    I missed the horses and donkeys this time.  They were out with the cows doing their  thing I guess.  So, next time .
Next, we head towards Alamosa, Colorado and the Great Sands Dunes National Park  as we  continue heading north.  One thing we have learned, is that April is still "iffy" for traveling in some of the high country and unlike California, Arizona , Nevada,  and Oregon there are still a lot  of campgrounds that do not open until May 1.  The RV park we stayed at in Chama (Twin Rivers) opened April 15 but it is the only one opened  out of about four  parks in Chama.