Our Mission
To demonstrate, teach, and advocate that returning to the land while utilizing traditional farming practices can allow us to grow healthier, more nutrient dense foods and live in healthier, more beautiful landscapes that honor God’s creation and show the utmost respect for his creatures while leaving it better off for future generations.
About Us
Hi there, we’re Jake and Jessica, the owners and operators of Black Ridge Farms along with our four kids.
While we both grew up involved in various aspects of agriculture, Black Ridge Farms is our first generation attempt at growing food utilizing methods that more closely resemble practices our great-great-grandparents would have been familiar with. Our focus shifted from raising/growing food using the more conventional methods we learned growing up after we started experiencing food allergies and sickness in ourselves and our kids from the foods we were consuming and the environment we were living in. This led us down a path of re-evaluation from the ground up of the foods we were growing, buying, and eating.
Our goal is to raise the healthiest, most honest, and best tasting food you’ll ever eat.
That only comes from animals who are happy, healthy, and living their best life.
It’s as simple as that.
About Our Farm
While we’re still very much learning and figuring it out as we go, our intentions are to raise our animals utilizing similar methods that farms would have relied on 150+ years ago. This means using regenerative techniques that worked for the thousands of years prior that honor the soil, the earth, our animals, and work in tandem with nature’s timelines.
Our farm is 100% chemical free. All of our animals are raised outdoors on grass in the fresh Pacific Northwest air. Our sheep and cattle are rotationally grazed, grass-fed and grass-finished. Our hogs and chickens are fed supplemental feed consisting of local spray-free grains. We want to raise food we feel good eating and showing to you at any point during the process.
Regenerative Farming
What does it mean to be a regenerative farm in our words?
- Carbon negative (sequesters more carbon than we emit)
- Builds top soil rather than depleting it
- Increases organic matter percentage in our soil farm-wide
- No chemical inputs or GMOs
- No systems or genetics that wouldn’t hold up or exist in nature
- Prioritizes animal health over relentless productivity and profit
- Pleasing to look at and be around (no monocultures, no manure slurries, etc.)
A good benchmark indicator of what a farm should be is you should be able to sit down and eat your dinner in the middle of the farm and have it be a pleasant experience.