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This Week’s Story: In Black and White Wedlock

“You married a Border Collie,” my rancher friend, Dan, simply stated as we drove across the Big Sky country of western South Dakota. Badland buttes dotted with junipers on a sea of high plains grass raced by my window. Dan’s fifty square mile “33” Ranch was stuck between two waves on the prairie ocean. The breaking foam on the west side was a crumbled sandstone rampart with a tangle of cedar on its summit. We both looked up to its peak in more silence than conversation. He inserted the next thought: “I know, because I married one, too. And you and I aren’t Border Collies. And that can be a major source of conflict.”…..

Store News

Next Shipping Date: Monday, April 28th

We generally ship every Monday, holiday weeks excepting (see calendar). You’ll get a tracking number when we ship your order. UPS may initially show an extra day of transit time, but will correct late Monday night when orders hit the Salt Lake hub.

Next Restock Date: Wednesday, April 30th

We restock every Wednesday and send out a sale flyer on Wednesday in the early evening with the week’s deals.

This Week’s Reader-Only Deals

Use the code “TOPSIRLOIN” to get 10% off organic grass fed regenerative top sirloin steaks and grass fed regenerative (non-certified) top sirloin steaks!

Use the code “#2SIXTEENTH” to get 5% off grass fed regenerative (non-certified) #2: sixteenths (shoulder tender, flatiron + sirloin steaks).

To access these sale items, and for more deals and products, you can click the button below!

Ranch News

Spring is never for certain at 5000 feet elevation, but these beeves seem pretty impervious to the snow. Photo credit Annie Elzinga.

Ethan, head shepherd, gives a well deserved scratch to one of his charges. These Dorper-Katahdin cross lambs are rubbing against anything they can find to lose their winter coats, and if it’s Ethan’s fingers that’s just fine. Photo credit Glenn Elzinga.

Jed spots while Aaron finds and excavates by hand yet another irrigation mainline leak! Frost damage discovery is common in the spring. Photo credit Jed Clements.

After settling the mama cows into a new paddock halfway down to our summer grazing country, they rest easy on deep green hay over the lush green that’s just coming up. Photo credit Jed Mitchell.

That’s Rose, fine tuning a water gap on the Judy lease ranch for the cows that just moved on to this new and upcoming pasture. Photo credit Josh Whitling.

That’s Spark, the young mare. Melanie’s been getting her tuned up for another summer in the high country. Those Mecate (or the Anglicized version: McCarty) reins are hand-braided by Melanie. Most of us who ride now get lucky enough to have the supple, soft and bomber-tough feel of her 4 strand braid in our hands. I haven’t met a range rider yet who doesn’t appreciate them. And they’re beautiful! Photo credit Melanie Elzinga.

Josh is still laying out that hay. We’ll keep doing it until the grass comes. The cows can’t wait. Photo credit Rose Morris.

Scott took a daring short-cut risk over the Continental Divide via Lemhi Pass to get dry ice for our beef shipping business. It’s the quickest way to Montana, where we meet our supplier. This is the exact view that Lewis and Clark had when they crossed the divide on the way to the Pacific in August of 1805. That distant belt of snow capped mountains discouraged them, because in August of that year, they were still draped with snow. I’m sure at that point they were tired of mountains, and they just wanted a clean ride to the ocean. Far more difficulties were ahead, for certain. Alderspring Ranch is just over those same mountains in the next valley. Photo credit Scott Rains.

This is the bachelor “RV Park.”  Right next to the bunkhouse, Webb, Justice and Jed made camp with their RVs, rather than living in a wooden “Shome” cabin with other intern roommates. They’ve built a little fire pit where they Dutch oven cook and occasionally share meals together after long days on the ranch. Photo credit Webb Johnson.

Louise, Clyde’s daughter, stands impervious despite streaks of snow. She’s a pup and has never been out on the range. A whole new world awaits her in the big country by her boss’s side. Photo credit Webb Johnson.

Your purchase supports our regenerative work. For more information go to https://www.alderspring.com/regenerative/.