Lytel Haefen began in 2017 with a dream of a new lifestyle, to become semi-reclusive in the middle of nowhere, with no neighbours and lots of animals. Our farm has made several transitions since it's beginnings and is constantly changing to meet the demands of our land, the environment, the services available to us, our financial constraints and the lessons that we encounter as go. We originally a
lso had waterfowl and pigs, but scaled back due to the limited knowledge of those species by the vets in our area. It was hard to give up the breeding animals we had raised and find them good homes to leave us for, but we had to do what was right for them. We also had several types of purebred chicken breeds, but found that there wasn't a lot of call for them in our area, so we sold up our breeding flocks and now only have a mixed flock for our own enjoyment. Every animal here has a name and is known for their individual personality as well as their name, even the chickens that look alike. Our founding buck was a purebred Boer named Sam, who we raised from just a couple of months old. Sam went to a new home at the age of 5 years and we retained some of his daughters to go on with. In 2022 we acquired a new purebred Boer buckling, Pan, as well as branching into the Anglo Nubians, which we hadn't had much to do with until then. We acquired Umber, a purebred Anglo Nubian buckling and bought in several purebred Anglo Nubian does as well as several new purebred Boer does. We no longer breed goats since the hay prices rose in 2024 from $80 per bale to $300, if you could get it at all. Both our herds we sold in early 2025 and we now only have a few retained girls as pets, with no bucks. When we first began, I wanted a pet pony, but hadn't had a horse or ridden a horse for over 20 years. We adopted Jupiter, a little Welsh mountain pony, from a private rescuer and when he was ready he was trained to harness. After a while we ended up with several ponies and horses. I registered a prefix under our farm name and we're considering occasionally breeding our registered Welsh section C mare, Cataraqui Pumkin. Our first foal was born on 28/09/22. Along with our foal, I was caring for several mares belonging to a friend and we had a few foals on the property at the same time. I absolutely loved this experience and enjoyed the early training and handling of them. All the animals here are tended to, including a bit of basic training and handling, at least twice daily when I do my rounds to feed out, check water troughs, collect eggs and check on everyone that resides here. Spending this time with foals has been a highlight for me and brings me joy like nothing else. In February 2023 our quarter horse. Harmony, gave birth to a c**t, sired by a Clydesdale x Andalusian. The c**t remained with his dam until she chose to wean him at 16 months old. He had a bout of colic just before moving to his new home and spent a further 2 months with us, undergoing treatment for an infection that he contracted while in the equine hospital have his colic treated. We were fortunate that we had saved quite a bit of money towards necessary house repairs at the time, so we were able to cover the costs required to save the foal's life. In September 2024, Pumpkin gave birth to a second foal, another filly, but this one wasn't planned. She was the result of a friend's yearling c**t being on our property for much longer than he was supposed to stay, and Pumpkin's bad habit of wrecking fences, to go where she shouldn't be. This filly was born a couple of weeks after my birthday and is exactly what I've always wanted, so we're keeping her. In mid 2025, an opportunity arose to purchase a well bred Gypsy cob c**t, from bloodlines that I was already familiar with. At that point, we had already sold 3 other horses, Pumpkin's first filly foal, Harmony's c**t foal, and the young sire of Pumpkin's second foal, who had become ours and we had gelded. We purchased Catori Park Cillian, with plans to have him dual trained in future and possibly keep him entire to breed with our mares. Cillain passed his DNA tests for health and he has gone from being completely wild, to a wonderful young stallion who's a credit to his breeder and bloodlines. In November 2025, Cillian was paired with both Pumpkin and Harmony, for foals due in late October 2026. In 2021/2022 we encountered our first predator problems. Our farm had been abandoned for a number of years prior to us purchasing it, so it was left in peace for some time, but it was only a matter of time before the foxes and feral cats realised there was a food source here. They weren't the only predators, we also had a number of items stolen, as well as a few purebred hens (vanished from locked coops) and a couple of pretty goat doelings (too old for a fox to take). So in 2022 we acquired our first livestock guardian dogs. I hit a new learning curve with training these pups, while I had many years experience in training numerous breeds of dog, I had never encountered an LGD before. They have been both a joy and a challenge, teaching me some new tricks while I teach them what I require of them. As the economy and climate changes ever faster these days, our farm will continue to change and either grow or reduce in species and production as required, to keep all of our animals safe, healthy and appropriately cared for. Welcome to our ride.
