Our Story

The Little Farm That Could was founded by Cricket Bishop in 2009. It has had many team members and support crew come though, but there's always been one constant: Cricket.

The Little Farm That Could has been a blessing, but not without its many challenges, or, "Educational Opportunities," as we like to call them. With a whimsical name like The Little Farm That Could, you know there's a fairy tale! Here's the story, as written by Cricket, founder of The Little Farm That Could.

Once upon a time....

I was born and raised in Garden Valley, California. My parents moved there from the bay area a year before I was born. They were looking to buy property in Auburn, Ca, and got lost. They stumbled on Garden Valley, fell in love with it and made that home. My mom always had horses, and my dad loved the mountains and physical labor.

Growing up, we usually bought a few drop calves at an auction, and bottle raised them. I learned about the cycle of life and where beef comes from, right then.

When I was five, it occurred to me that milk comes from cows, but we don't get milk from ours, only meat. My mom told me that to milk the cows, they have to have babies first. Well, five-year old Me thought that was a brilliant idea! Mom said no, because we'd have to have a bull, and that was that.

When I was 18, I moved out and I became a horse trainer, travelling show groom, barista, and waitress, before finally landing back in Garden Valley. Completely by coincidence, I ended up renting a house that was two doors away from my parents. The woman who owned it lived about 30 minutes from there, and why she took a chance on me, I will never know, but I am so glad she did. The first week, my car broke irreparably and I lost my job. My landlady allowed me to make weekly rent payments, instead of once a month. I rented out a room upstairs for half of my rent, and I got incredibly lucky for the other half. After a series of lucky and well-timed events, I was tired of depending on luck.

One day, I was hand delivering rent since it was too late to mail it, and I saw that she lived on a farm. I offered my services in exchange for half of the rent each month, and she was delighted to agree!

Very soon after, she (Pattie) informed me that she was getting a milk cow. She said she just became a Grandma and, "I'll be damned if I'm going to let my Grandbaby drink store bought milk!" She educated me on how store-bought milk is adulterated, and I became a believer! Not only did I become a believer, but I also became a Milk-Maid! Pattie was an almost-retired fire-fighter, and she still had to occasionally go in for 48-hour shifts, which is not conducive to milking a cow.

I learned all about Jersey cows and Raw Milk, and so much in between, right alongside Pattie. It was an incredible experience and changed the trajectory of my life. <check out Patties farm>

I discovered that with my horse background, it was really easy to adapt to, and understand cows. I've only ever been a natural at two things in my life, and milking a cow was one of them! I loved the raw milk so much that I started to work in trade for milk, however, that interfered with my rent arrangement and I decided to get a milk cow of my own. Enter "Bella the Miracle Milk Cow." Bella has a whole story of her own, that you can <read here>.

I started a "cow share", where one would sell "shares" or percentages of a cow, and the customer would pay for feed and care of the cow in proportion to their percentage owned, then they would receive a portion of what that cow produces, in this case: Milk. And let me tell you: When folks find out you have fresh milk, suddenly you have a lot of new friends.

I still had a lot of milk left over. So I made Yogurt. And Cheese, And Ice Cream. And Butter. And still had milk.

Well, the obvious thing to do was to raise a pig. We could fatten it on milk and garden waste. But one pig would need company, so better raise two. Well, let me tell you: when folks find out you're raising bacon, suddenly you have a lot of new friends.

We sold pork, enough to pay to raise one for the family. That worked so well that it seemed obvious to raise more piglets. But if you are going to buy more piglets, you might as well buy a pregnant sow... keep how many you want to raise and sell the rest as weaners. But if you have a sow, you also need a boar...and if you're feeding a sow and a boar all year, you need to sell three litters of weaners to cover all expenses. So you need two sows.

Meanwhile, with all these piglets to feed, you'll need a second milk cow, so that when one dries up you won't be out of milk. and if you're going to get milk, you'll have to make babies. Just like Mom said all these years ago, "you need a bull to make a baby." So, I acquired a miniature jersey bull, and we made calves. And we found out that Jersey beef has incredible flavor! And by the way, when folks find out that you have beef, suddenly you have a lot of new friends!

This was just the beginning, but it was enough that I was "IN". From there, I experimented with many different breeds (of cows and pigs), I made a ton of mistakes that cost a lot of time, a lot of money, and quite often a life. I contract-raised pigs and chickens for a meat distributor, and I became the local expert on "Introduction to the family milk cow."

I learned SO much! I learned about:

-Health and how food plays an integral role

-Food: how to produce and preserve

- Animals: how to raise them in the healthiest and happiest ways

-Efficiency and genetics: why they are important and how to spot them

- Self Reliance: because not of lot of my new friends wanted to chase pigs at 3am with me

...and I learned about Life, Love, Death, and Values in a way that nothing else could ever illustrate as well as farming.

But, although I'd had an entrepreneurial spirit, and great work ethic, there was too much for one person to do. Jake moved in and jumped on the crazy train in 2018, and with his help, on and off the farm, it was able to grow. I'd finally grown my cattle for long enough to see the fruits of my selection and it was exciting! <Read here about the "Homestead Cow" and why it's awesome>

But, there was still one big missing link.

When I was contracting pigs to a friend of mine, we made a discovery that is now well known: Farmers do not know how to market, and Marketers do not know how to farm. Moreover, most farmers do not have the time it takes or the resources to market, or even learn it. That's why it was such a beautiful relationship: because I could focus on doing what I do best: raise happy, healthy animals, without worrying that I'd have no outlet for them. And my friend, Doug, could do what he did best: Reach out to customers, educate them, establish a relationship with them, and ship them pig-in-a-box.

Doug handled all the logistics: cash advances to buy feed, processing dates, transportation, and sales.

He was so successful at this, that he bought a ranch in Wyoming and now raises his own meat. <check out his farm here>

What was I to do now? I didn't want to give up and sell my animals that I had spent so long creating. I did what many farmers do: I got a "real" job. I accidentally became a full time mail-carrier (I was only going to sub on the weekends, to help cover feed costs). This was great income, and close to home, so I could pop in and check on critters if there was a "situation".

Long story short, there were two things in my life that I've been a natural at: Milking a cow was one, and being a Mail-Carrier was the other. Never saw that coming. I became immersed, and within a year and a half, I was managing 9 mail routes. The income was great, but I had no time for the farm anymore, and it was starting to show.

I didn't have time to meet with new potential customers and show them my passion,

I didn't have time to arrange pick up and drop off for existing customers,

I didn't have time to update any one on any thing new at the farm,

I didn't spend time with the animals, so some of them became wild,

and suddenly, I had no income from the animals, while I was spending all my money to feed them, and had no time to enjoy them.

Drought and inflation got worse, and I had seriously considered selling off my herd, but I just couldn’t see that picture. But I really needed some time off from them, to catch up and dig out of this hole I was in.

I was at a crossroads.

I had a few Serendipitous events happen, which changed my trajectory, again.

In October of last year, my friend Doug called me and said he had sent a link to a grant that I NEED to apply for. He said it would take five minutes and was nearly a sure thing, so I did. And then I forgot all about it.

In the mean-time, having decided I did not want to sell, the best scenario I could imagine is someone else “borrowing” them. A situation where someone would take over the herd and all the associated expenses (excluding emergencies, which I would handle), and in exchange, they would get to keep whatever the herd produces during their care. This seemed like an AMAZING opportunity for someone that wanted to build a herd and didn’t have the capital up front to do so. It would be a win for me, also, as I would get to “suspend” expenses for a year or two, without giving up the herd that I had spent a decade building. I decided that with the right person, that would be a win, and I immediately listed the offer.

Shockingly.. I got no bites. I could hardly believe it. I became discouraged, thinking I was right back to my hamster wheel.

That is when I saw an ad for Grass Fed Marketing. I was skeptical, but curious, so I scheduled a discovery call.

This was the answer I had been looking for! Cam King, marketer AND farmer! A Bridge to the notorious gap. The team at GFM provides step-by-step instructions and all the details in between, to help farmers like me, that don’t know about the tech world, to be able to communicate to our potential customers, efficiently. How to list my inventory and offers, easily. How to make the purchase simple for the customer and uncomplicated. They hold my hand each step of the way, and they already have a proven system in place for every bit of the journey, even tips and supply lists for packing up boxes to ship. By leveraging my time, I can now spend more time taking care of the cows, and keeping in touch with my supporters, because I'm not spending time trying to find sales.

My friend Doug, who sells meat-in-a-box, has done a very similar thing, but without a tech team. And it took him years. I asked him what it would be worth, if someone had told him all those years ago, exactly how to do it step by step... He said priceless.

But there is a price, and while it’s well worth it, I had no idea where I was going to get this funding for this project.

Remember that grant application that I forgot about? It was for a very specific set of possibilities. One of them is called Market Pivoting. Essentially, that means, “I used to sell at farmers market and now I can't, so I need to sell on the internet and I don’t know how. I need to buy training.”

Done.

Sometimes I think farming is noble work, and sometimes I think it is a fools mission, but at the end of the day, I think it's what I was made to do.

The Little Farm That Could does not believe that everyone is made to be a farmer, but we do believe that everyone should have access to healthy, happy, farm raised meat. We can now provide that to you and your families, as convenient as delivering to your door!