Dear Friends and Partners,
Welcome to Alderspring’s weekend edition newsletter! Thank you for partnering in what we do!
Below you can find beef discounts, Glenn’s weekly story, and lots of photos from the ranch this week!
This Week’s Story: “Buck, Black, and Blizzard”
Weekend flash deal: 15% off hot Italian sausage and chorizo!
Plus this week: 15% off oxtails and beef hot dogs!
This Week’s Store Update & Coupons
NEXT SHIPPING DAY: Monday, Oct 9! Order by Sunday night at midnight on the 8th to get your box shipped out on the 9th
NOTE: We aren’t shipping Monday the 16th! If you want beef before the 23rd, order by the 8th at midnight!
What’s In Stock
We apologize that unprecedented demand is draining the store. We restock 2x a month with fresh off-the-range processing! With fall harvest increases, we should be able to meet your needs going forward! We do still have some ground beef, 3Fs, sausages, quite a few roasts, sockeye salmon, ground lamb and wild hunter in stock!
Butter & Cheese are Back
After being sold out for a few weeks, Ernie’s organic biodynamic brown swiss cultured Butter and delicious cheeses are back in! Like us, Lifeline Farms is a small scale operation, which means limited inventory. We’re grateful they’ve shared some of that with us in this week’s restocking!
This week’s coupon cuts
Flash deal: this weekend, 15% off hot Italian and chorizo sausage. It’s a spicy sausage party! And this week’s discounts are still continuing: 15% off oxtails and beef hot dogs!
If you have any questions, observations, or comments, just send Kelsey an email at help[at]alderspring[dot]com.
A Note on Inventory
We wanted to explain in a little more detail here what’s going on with the low inventory lately. We know many of you have been with us for a long time and rely on us as your source of protein (and we’re so grateful)!
The last couple weeks, we’ve been hit with an unexpected wave of demand.
When it comes to raising beef, sudden changes in demand can be very difficult to respond to quickly. It takes us 2-3 years to raise an animal to finish. That means we plan our inventory needs about 2 years in advance. We know many producers who respond to sudden increases in demand by simply buying outside cattle and butchering those cattle under their label (this was especially common during the sudden demand hit during covid). This kind of “cow flipping” goes against our standards and isn’t something we’re willing to do.
With that said, we can’t make dramatic increases but we do have the ability to slightly increase our inventory within the next few weeks here. We’re hoping this resolves some of the problems you all are having with getting your meats!
But we wanted to provide this more detailed explanation to all of you. The reason many of you prefer to buy from us is because we’re small scale. We butcher our cattle at a small processor that only does about 80 head of cattle per week (compared to thousands at a big facility), and we raise only as many cattle as our pastures can support without degrading soils. We carefully curate every single steak. Our small size means we can pay attention to detail. But it also means occasional inventory limitations!
Recent Photos From the ranch…
Bryce snapped this photo this week of the herd out on pasture, quite content eating the fall grass we’ve saved for them. You can see in the foreground a salt tub (containing pure Redmond salt) and that diverse mix of forage. It’s too cold now to get much growth. But it’s still green, and when you taste a blade of this you can actually taste the sugars. It’s some of our best forage of the year, really…and the beeves agree!
This past week, a few of the Elzinga girls and some friends escaped for an all-girls backpack trip onto…the range. That’s right, they literally went backpacking on the range they spent all summer herding cattle from. It’s because it’s home. They know their way around and feel comfortable out there (wilderness as it is). Linnaea snapped this photo of their view as they hiked down to their camp spot at Hat Creek Lakes, a network of glacial lakes hidden in these mountains. The girls agreed while cooking around the campfire that it was kind of nice to be out on the range without cows for once. Even though they all enjoy herding cows, it was good to just hang out and enjoy camp instead of getting up bright and early to get cows grazing and coming back long after dark to cook a late night meal by lantern light.
A few more photos from the backpacking trip from Brittany. There’s Annie, watching as breakfast cooks up over an open fire. During the summer, we couldn’t have a campfire in cow camp due to the dry conditions and risk of sparks igniting a forest fire. But with temperatures well below freezing at night, and occasional fall rain, a well managed wood fire in their camp along the banks of one of several lakes was a welcome respite from the cool fall weather. Also pictured is Linnaea, taking a break during the hike in!
Brittany also took this photo of a calf coming back from a trip to the vet. Somehow this little guy got hung up on something and irreparably damaged his eye. We quickly rushed him to our local vet and they surgically removed the eye. He should heal up just fine and has returned to his mom!
There is Milo, Jed’s trusty sidekick, looking a little too enthused with some of that bovine-processed fall grass all over his face.
Scott is pictured here with Titus and Thor, checking the cover crop. We planted 14 species this year, everything from annual clovers to turnips.
Melanie snapped this photo one morning on the front lawn after a frost the night before. While we can still get away with running a sprinkler most nights, the pivots are off for the season.
Becky grew this crop of sunflowers for her July wedding. The remaining blooms have since shriveled and faded with colder temperatures, but they’re still beautiful in their own way. Photo by Melanie.
The sunset the other night was absolutely beautiful, and Melanie captured a few photos of it.
Pictured here are the retired geriatric horses, photographed by Melanie. Ginger, the buckskin, was Glenn’s mount for years. She carried him many miles on the range before arthritis slowed her down. April, the black, taught almost all of the Elzinga girls how to ride. She is opinionated and gritty beyond belief. She is likely in her late thirties or early forties, but you would think she’s in her twenties. She gets around with barely a hitch and maintains her body condition with the help of some good grass. They’re legendary.
There is some of the firewood harvest this fall, ready for the furnace when the icy grip of winter tightens on the valley. Photo by Melanie.
Melanie photographed this view of the drive into town this past week to pack and ship your orders! It was a beautiful early morning drive, with fog clinging onto the hills beside the river. We drive the 50 miles to town so often, it’s easy to forget how beautiful it is, but the changing seasons are a good reminder.
This week has been an incredibly busy one, as we prepare for a wedding! Maddy and Wesley are getting married. The ceremony location is beautiful, but there was one problem: a big irrigation ditch between the parking and seating areas. Wesley’s dad to the rescue with this awesome bridge construction project!
Want to follow along more day-to-day? Find us on Instagram and Facebook.
Quote of the Week
“O hushed October morning mild,
-Excerpted from October by Robert Frost
Begin the hours of this day slow.
Make the day seem to us less brief.
Hearts not averse to being beguiled,
Beguile us in the way you know.
Release one leaf at break of day;
At noon release another leaf;
One from our trees, one far away.
Retard the sun with gentle mist;
Enchant the land with amethyst.
Slow, slow!”
This week’s story: “Buck, Black, and Bliza”
It’s October, and that means the weather takes no prisoners. Today, it was 75 degrees. Tomorrow it may be dramatically different (forecast says it’s supposed to be the same–which is good, as we have a daughter getting married on the ranch tomorrow).
I recalled one trip across Montana a few years back in October, where I was bringing finished or “fat” cattle to our processor. It was a beautiful drive up. But on the way back, it fully unraveled.
Over the years, we’ve learned to put up with the sudden changes, and there’s some of us who seem to actually thrive in it. This week’s tale is about one such salt of the earth still working relic that I found on the Montana outback. Working. No one knew that he was–he wasn’t doing it to impress anyone or post on instagram.
He just was.
And I’m realizing that there’s less and less of that today. People seem to be caught up so much in appearance in some sort of narcissistic fever that’s taken over our culture. Meanwhile, there’s still some out there. All alone. Getting it done.
Buck was one of those.
Happy Trails.
Continue reading the story on our blog by clicking below!
And that’s it for this week!
Thanks again for partnering in what we do!
Glenn, Caryl, cowgirls and cowboys at Alderspring.
We’ve been crafting our pastured protein here in Idaho’s Rocky Mountains for nearly 30 years and delivering it direct to our partners for nearly as long. This is wild wellness, delivered from our ranch to your door.
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Beautiful story! Beautiful pictures! Thank you so much for sharing with us!!!
I so enjoyed your letter this week, the beautiful descriptions and photos of your land, the poem of October by Robt Frost which moistened my eyes. Would love to see a pic of the wedding couple! Thank you for all you all do.
Thanks for taking the time to read, Kay. We’ll be sharing a few photos from the wedding in our next newsletter!
I don’t order much animal protein, but occasionally do from you! But your letters from Alderspring are a must read every time they show up in my email. Thank you so much for the poetic oftentimes description of life on the ranch.
Pam
Thank you so much for reading every week, Pam!