Responsibly Grown As Stewards to the Earth
Among the hills and trees of Northeast Kansas, Rocky Top Ranch produces Katahdin Hair Sheep, poultry, heritage hogs, and garden produce using responsible agricultural methods that steward both livestock and land.
Welcome to Rocky Top Ranch
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What We Produce
Katahdin Hair Sheep
Our primary product here is Katahdin Hair Sheep. We raise these commercially for meat sales. They are primarily forage fed with very little grain or pellet input. This variety of sheep grows a winter wool coat that is sheds out in Spring so they do not need sheered. The wool that is shed is of little use; although nearly every bird’s nest within a half mile probably has some of this wool in it. We do not dock tails or castrate as our general market does not seek this nor is it any benefit to our operation to do so.
If you are interested in purchasing a butcher lamb or a slaughter ewe, please contact us to get on the list in advance. The majority of our crop is sold to an order buyer as a whole unit.
Heritage Hogs
We grow a variety of heritage hogs here: Hereford, American Red Wattle, Gloucestershire Old Spot, and their blends. Please see our links section to learn more about these breeds. All of these hogs are raised in large dirt lots with routine access to pasture paddocks. They are never kept on concrete or inside hog houses such as commercially produced commodity swine. They are fed a diet of locally produced grains, produce, prairie hay, and forage from the pastures. We do not keep these hogs on constant concentrated feed from a self-feeder, but instead feed them twice daily a measured ration to control growth and encourage them to forage more. The sows have their offspring in nests they make themselves of hay and sticks. Depending on the season some do this in shelters and sometimes they do this under the trees outdoors—they get to choose. We do not push litters of piglets through these sows, but rather only breed them about once every six months to allow them to recuperate and again live a more natural lifestyle. These pigs are sold as grown butcher hogs, BBQ size pigs, feeder pigs, and breeding stock.
Livestock Guardian Dogs
Livestock Guardian Dogs(LGD's) are a necessity in raising sheep and other small livestock in areas where coyotes and stray dogs roam. We have Great Pyrenees, Anatolian Shepherd, and Bernese Mountain Dog in our pack. Occasionally we sell pups from a mix of these breeds. We do not register dogs as registration and showing dogs is not important to us. We raise these dogs to be livestock guardians or family guardians. If you are interested in getting a dog or pup from us please contact us to get on the list and we can go over the details.
Poultry
Our poultry are a motely crue of critters. We grow upwards of a thousand chickens a year of various breeds for uses from meat birds for slaughter, egg production breeds, to fancy yard birds. There are various breeds and colors of ducks as well as Muscovy. Guineas are a common sight and sound here too. There are also some Royal Palm and mixed meat breeds of turkeys. Many people buy our poultry for their backyard or hobby farm for uses from eggs and meat to just enjoying their colors and antics on the farm. Please note: We do not sell slaughtered poultry.
We hatch out a lot of our poultry, but to maintain the number we sell and consume, we must purchase from outside providers. Some is purchased from local farm stores and the bulk is purchased from regional hatcheries.
Garden Products
On our half acre garden plot we grow a variety of fruits and vegetables. This includes sweet corn, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, broccoli, garlic, summer/winter squash, green beans, cabbage, radishes, turnips, melons, cucumbers, okra, meal corn, tomatoes, peppers, and carrots—I might have missed a few! As we do not go to farmer’s markets with our produce, please contact us to get on a list if you are interested in purchasing produce in the future. We do some delivery as well as fresh pickup from the farm.
Some of the seeds we use are heirloom seeds and some we purchase from purveyors we have grown to trust.
Firewood
Firewood is available year around. Contact me for current prices and available species. Most of the wood is cut for wood burning stoves and comes in hard woods such as oak, hickory, osage, ash, hackberry, locust, mulberry, walnut, etc. Woods for smoking or cooking over can be procured as well in such species as apple, hickory, oak, pear, pecan, grapewood, etc. Since most of these are preferred green, please provide some notice so that they can be cut to your order
Seeds
Some of the seeds we use are heirloom seeds and some we purchase from purveyors we have grown to trust.
Pre-Order TodayBee Products
We have numerous bee hives here. We use them to aid in pollination of some of our garden crops as well as various native flower species that also serve as forage for our livestock. At this time we do not have any bee products for sale. If you are interested in bee products we can provide you with contacts of our neighboring apiaries who do have bee products for sale.