Carlton Hill Farm

11/07/2025

When we started this farm, people laughed and asked what difference a single acre could make.

We’d like to thank Mountain State Spotlight for featuring our work as we keep showing what one acre, and a couple people who refuse to quit, can do in the middle of a food crisis here in West Virginia.

While other businesses roll out branded merchandise and marketing campaigns, we’re packing boxes with beans, rice, peanut butter, and other pantry staples every day to feed the people our nation forgot how to feed.

That’s the difference between marketing and meaning.

A federal SNAP delay has left thousands in West Virginia without support. Volunteers say they’re overwhelmed.

11/03/2025

We left social media back in August after the backlash we received for supporting one simple thing: feeding people. But silence is not an option anymore.

Our farm feeds people. That is what we do. From now on, our social media will exist for one purpose only: to promote our no-barrier pantry, Farm for Better.

Overnight, our pantry requests have increased by more than 1500 percent. That is not growth. That is collapse. Politicians on both sides of the aisle are starving our neighbors while arguing about who to blame. They woke up with full bellies this morning. The people they failed did not.

We cannot do this alone. It is free to write your legislators. It is free to share this post. It is free to make a call to a friend: ask if they have food, ask if they are okay. Showing up matters.

Read how we have responded to the SNAP crisis and how you can help:

As a farm that accepts donations, we feel it is our obligation to inform our community, our customers, and anyone we interact with how we are responding to SNAP benefits stopping.

08/16/2025

This farm feeds people. If that offends you, you’re not our people.✌️

This is where you'll find us.

https://carltonhillfarm.com/newsletter

08/15/2025

LISTEN UP!

We’ve been removing offensive comments from our EBT post because some people turned food insecurity into a political joke. If you laugh at food insecurity, you are the rot in the world. If you have nothing kind to say, stay silent. If you ever find yourself down on your luck, remember how you treated people who were already there. And yes, we will continue to remove every ignorant voice from our posts. You will not speak that here.

No hashtags. No performance. Full Stop.

08/15/2025

We name every chicken because it keeps them alive. Donna rushes to the door to be picked up every day. If she doesn’t, we know something is wrong. Naming helps us track traits, spot early changes, protect the flock from sickness or predators, and manage smaller groups for consistent egg production. Learn why knowing each bird shapes the way we farm:
https://carltonhillfarm.com/blog/the-joy-of-naming-our-chickens

One of the best parts of getting a new pet is picking out its name. We spend hours bouncing ideas off of each other until a name clicks, and we just can't let it go. Our dogs, Moira and Clementine (Clemmy) started a new trend for us of naming our pets after comedies, a trend that we've now carried o

08/14/2025

We refuse to leave people behind. When farms control who gets access to good food, they decide who gets left out. Accepting EBT/SNAP is one way we make sure more people can shop here, take home real food, and keep their dollars in the community. SNAP is the largest food access program in the country, and for many families it is the only way to afford fresh, healthy food. We are proud to announce that we are now an EBT/SNAP retailer and our system is live.

Through our Farm for Better program, every inch of our farm works toward the same goal: making high-quality, locally raised food accessible to SNAP households.

Good food should never be a privilege.

Read more about our Farm for Better initiative here:

https://carltonhillfarm.com/farm-for-better

08/13/2025

The halo effect: when ‘local’ makes you think it’s better, but it’s the same corporate supply chain in smaller clothes. Here’s why that matters:

08/06/2025

Sourcing matters. Just because the cashier lives nearby doesn’t mean the ingredients do. If the food was grown, processed, and shipped from across the country, it's no different than calling a foreign-made car "American" just because it was painted here.

It’s not a vibe. It’s a supply chain.

08/02/2025

If you're ever near Pittsburgh, check out West View Urban Farm. Learn more about the great things they're doing with mutual aid, fresh food access, and community growing. Their pantry and produce basket at 551 Perry Hwy is just one example of how local food can feed people directly, no red tape. Give them a follow and see what real community looks like.

07/26/2025

Our version of DoorDash: Quail Edition

🚪 Open the hutch door

🏃‍♂️ Dash to the processing station

🧂 Add a dash of seasoning

🍽️ Dinner in 20 minutes

Total cost: $0.50 in feed

Delivery time: Faster than your pizza

Freshness guarantee: It was alive 20 minutes ago

No surge pricing. No delivery fees. No wondering what's actually in your food.

Just the way humans ate for thousands of years before we decided that depending on strangers for survival was somehow 'progress.'

07/20/2025

Real wealth isn't numbers on a screen that can disappear with a market crash or policy change. It's not a retirement account you can't touch for 30 years or a credit score that someone else controls.

Real wealth is what you can see, touch, and use right now. It's the meat in your freezer that you raised yourself - protein that doesn't depend on supply chains or grocery store prices. It's solar panels generating your own power while your neighbors get hit with rate increases. It's a water system that works when the city's doesn't.

Real wealth is your workshop full of tools that let you fix instead of replace. It's the knowledge in your head that can't be deleted by a software update. It's time that belongs to you instead of being sold to the highest bidder.

We used to chase paper wealth - 401k balances, home equity, credit scores. All of it controlled by other people, dependent on systems designed to extract from us. Now we build tangible wealth that serves us directly.

Your freezer full of meat you raised? That's recession-proof. Your solar system? That's inflation-proof. Your ability to grow food, fix equipment, and live independently? That's future-proof.

Money is just a tool. Real wealth is what that tool can build when you use it intentionally instead of letting it get managed by people who profit from your dependence.

What does real wealth look like to you?

07/19/2025

We don’t joke about torturing animals.

Yesterday someone commented on our TikTok video of 42 baby quail hatching: “where’s the part when they put the rattlesnake in?”

I’m the snake. I take life here. Quail. Rabbits. Every week. I hold it. End it. Clean it. Feed people with it. That part happens whether you watch it or not.

But that’s not enough anymore. A bird hatching doesn’t register unless something dies on camera. It’s not real unless it bleeds.

This is what happens when people are too far removed from their food. They treat death like entertainment and the people who carry the burden like performers. The killing has to be visible. The suffering has to be exaggerated. Or it doesn’t count.

But this isn’t for show. It’s a farm. These animals are real. The labor is real. And the weight of taking life never goes away.

If a quiet birth feels disappointing, maybe ask what kind of damage it takes to hold your attention.