WE ARE FAMILY FARMERS.
Dedicated families raise our lambs with care. We only work with ranchers who are as committed to care of the animals and the environment as we are.
SUSTAINABILITY SINCE 1964.
Sustainability is an inherent quality of our business. It starts in the pasture and extends to every facet of what we do.
WE MAKE CHANGE THROUGH INNOVATION.
Our ranchers bring innovation in sustainability, grazing lamb in vineyards to reduce heavy equipment use while replenishing nutrients and microbes in the soil.
THE BITNERS.
“Raising sheep is what I like to do,” says Brian Bitner, adding that he returned to his family’s land after working in the corporate world as an engineer.
Brian Bitner is a fourth generation sheep rancher. He says that, while sheep raising started with his granddad, he most likely inherited the sheep-raising gene directly from his dad, who loved the sheep and ranch.
THE CASKEYS.
Mike Caskey is a performance records man who knows what can be achieved when records guide management decisions. Mike is a fourth-generation sheep producer and manages Pine Lawn Farms in partnership with his wife Carrie and their adult sons Jason and Kyle.
THE DAWSONS.
Twins. If Dan Dawson of Roseburg, Oregon had his druthers, every ewe on his place would have a set of twins.
To up his odds of getting twin lambs, Dan only keeps ewes that are twins as replacements. Another way Dan improves his chances of getting twins is through better nutrition.
“While twinning is genetically linked, it’s also related to nutrition,” he explains. Nutrition to Dan isn’t grain, however. Dan’s operation is 100 percent grass-based, and his ranches are located where grass typically loves to grow. The terrain is primarily hilly, almost mountainous, with a few flat areas here and there.
THE GUNDERMANS.
Bruce and Karla Gunderman of Westbrook, Minnesota run a sheep enterprise with 909 employees, and every one of them is expected to meet certain production goals — but they aren’t two-legged employees. They’re ewes.
