Hillview Family Farms

10/08/2026

That’s a wrap on our soybean harvest for the year! We were definitely hurt by the dry second half of the summer. In the low, heavy soil the crop was excellent, but many of the hilltops had little to nothing growing on them.

09/28/2026

For those of you playing along at home, the answer to the “Find our Cows” game is 20. You may need a magnifying glass, but they are there!

09/26/2026

👀 How many cows can YOU spot in our grazing picture?? It’s more than you first think! Drop us a comment with your guess

09/06/2026

Today we did some crop scouting. The second half of the summers been dry, but the last month or so has yielded us almost no rain and it definitely hurt the crops. We won’t know just how much until the combine starts rolling through the field, but this is a good illustration. Soybeans naturally turn from green to yellow to brown, but when they are experiencing stress it speeds up the process.

You could lay this picture over a soil type map and it would follow perfectly that the lighter the color, the lighter (more gravel) is in the soil. The dark green spots are the heavier clay soil which can hold moisture longer, and the brown spots are mostly gravel which does not hold moisture well at all. In the brown spots the plant has been stressed to the point where it had to put its remaining energy into finishing what beans it had made rather than making more. Depending on what growth stage the plant was in at the time of the stress, it will put fewer total pods on, or it will put only 2 beans in each pod instead of the usual 3 or 4 beans per pod.

At the end of the day we can only play the hand we are dealt and our goal is to put ourselves in the best possible situation to handle whatever cards Mother Nature deals us!

08/27/2026

If you’ve been thinking about buying direct off of the farm before but have never done it, or if you “used to have a guy” but don’t anymore, we’ve got you covered!! Once you try our beef you won’t want to go back to buying it from the store. You can order your cuts exactly how you’d like them, and we’ve got quarters or halves that will be available the end of September.

Want a smaller quantity? We’ve got you covered there too!! Check out our website for all of your locally grown and processed, USDA inspected beef needs!

https://hillviewfamilyfarms.com/Processing-Dates

08/13/2026

We’ve got our third cutting of alfalfa down for the year. Making dry hay is our preference when possible because we don’t have to move all of the water weight inside of the bales, which saves wear and tear on our equipment, compaction in our fields, and the cost of plastic to wrap the bales. We’ve been using a hay Tedder which takes the windrows that the discbine leaves and spreads them apart to aid in faster drying. It’s another pass across the field, but it significantly reduces the amount of time it takes to get the hay dry. A few more hot sunny days and we’ll have a nice pile of dry bales made!

07/17/2026

It’s been a little warm this week! Mid 90’s with high humidity, and we’ve got chickens that will be processed in just a few days. With hot days and large chickens, keeping the barns cool is critical to keeping the birds alive. We use what’s called “tunnel” ventilation, where all of the air is pulled in from one side of the barn, and exhausted out the other, which creates a wind tunnel that is designed to pull the heat away from the birds. The air inlets are equipped with evaporative coolers that chill the incoming air, making it more comfortable inside the barn than it is outside on hot days.

Here you can see the evaporative coolers, if you look close you can see the water trickling down them providing the cooling effect.

07/10/2026

We’ve had great moisture so far this year and the crops definitely reflect that! But it has been tricky to get hay dry. With a dry few days in the forecast we cut most of our meadow today, some of it has standing water in it and was too wet, but we cut what we could. The windrows were so big they barely fit under the tractor, it’s going to be a lot of bales!

07/05/2026

On this 250th anniversary, we find ourselves thinking back to the generations who came before us. Their will to find a better world and carve out a place in that new world where they could raise a family. The incredible sacrifices they made when they left their homeland on a ship, then continued west by horse or on foot until they found a place to start over. The months of labor put in to clear the trees to build a shelter and to prepare the soil for seeds to try to keep their families fed during the long winters, all to do it again the next summer. Never realizing how the fruits of their labor would be felt for generations to come.

This is the story of our ancestors, their grit and willingness to work for everything they had, their faith that things would work out, and the freedom to play their part in building the greatest country on earth.

Not a day goes by that we don’t feel honored that we get to work the land, be the stewards for our animals, and raise our family here thanks to those who came before us! Here’s to another 250 years! 🍻

06/27/2026

https://hillviewfamilyfarms.com/Order

Picture this:

You’ve got everything ready for your 4th of July celebration. The snacks are served, your deck seating is arranged, the beverages are ice cold, you’ve even got some sweet fireworks ready to light, but wait, you forgot to get the beef!!

Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered! To celebrate peak grilling season, all of our steaks are on sale from now until July 4th. Grab some of our locally grown and processed, no growth hormones ever, ON SALE steaks or ground beef!

Order on Hillview Family Farms. Custom order premium beef packages, perfectly tailored to your taste.