Gavilan Trading Post

The Gavilan Trading Post is located on the Valley of the Moon Ranch in Gavilan, NM.
Valley of the Moon Ranch is host to a small community of family and friends building a diverse, self sufficient, biodynamic farm.

The ranch is also home to the historical Gavilan Trading Post, an old adobe store built in the 1920's. The Trading Post is currently out of service and will soon be restored as funds allow. The store is eventually to be reopened as store and art studio.

The people of The Ranch offer many services through the Gavilan Trading Post store front, including horse training, goat sales, glass art, designer cashmere handwovens, educational farming opportunities, computer/web services and more.

Delicious USDA certified goat meat is now available for purchase!

This meat is produced from our own herd of goats whom are grass fed, free ranging on northern New Mexico pastures and are holistically/humanly managed.

Cuts & Prices:

Loin Chop $13
Rib Chop $11
Shoulder Chop $9
Boneless Shoulder Roast $9 (Approximately 6lb-7lb Roast)
Boneless Leg Roast $9 (Approximately 5lb Roast)
Bone-in Shoulder Roast $8 (Approximately 6lb-7lb Roast)
Bone-in Leg Roast $8 (Approximately 7lb to 8lb Roast)
Shanks $8 (Two shanks per package. Approximately 2lb-3lbs per package)
Ground $7
Ribs $5

Pick up locations in Los Ranchos and on the farm in Lindrith. Please contact us for more information.

In February we acquired seventy five Australorp chicks. These chicks are to serve as laying hens in the future. We are hopeful they will produce enough eggs for not only us but for any of our neighbors whom would like to eat good locally produced eggs. But it will be quite a while until we see any eggs, as these ladies are still young, small baby birds.

Those chicks fill my heart with joy as I have always taken a particular liking to “the flock”. Our family has always had chickens and we have always raised them from a few days old. I had taken a special interest in the chick rearing from a young age and because of that, the chick rearing has been “my job” since I was about eight years old.
I am of the opinion that chickens are pretty cool creatures. Besides the obvious benefits of leaving us with fresh eggs, good manure, and aerated soil. They also possess creepy dinosaur like qualities. At least how I picture dinosaurs which has been greatly shaped by an obsession with the movie “Jurassic Park”, an obsession that started at an early age and has now extended into adult hood. The chickens, much like my perception of the Dino's, look at you like they are always figuring out if there is any possible way they could consume your delicious flesh but so far none of my hens have succeeded in figuring out a way to accomplish that tasty possibility.
When the hens aren't trying to figure out a way to eat you, they usually spend their time chasing smaller things that they can consume, such as bugs and defenseless blades of grass. They also partake in non eating activities, like, taking dirt baths in the sun, roaming around in groups talking with each other in their eerie chicken language (Chickens are very social animals) and sometimes they even spend some time laying an egg. On top of all this, they are also extremely aesthetically pleasing.

Although these Chicken-ey qualities I do find very entertaining, the birds themselves aren't always the most personable creatures. There are exceptions though, like “Red” a hen that made a habit of following Marcus around because he was always working on projects around the farm that would reveal juicy grubs, red worms and the like. He knew what she was after and he obliged his chicken friend by throwing her any bugs he came upon. It's been a few years since Marcus and Red have had their daily bonding activities, as Marcus moved away some time ago. But Red has not forgotten about her special snack time with Marcus and so she stalks around projects to this very day. Unfortunately for Red, most of the farm interns have no idea what she wants and so they don't throw her any scrumptious bugs, and so, she is left to forage for herself. “Keep trying Red. One of these days someone will understand you again”.

The chicks too, lack a bit in the “personable critter department” yet are often times captivating to watch. Not because they do anything all that interesting but there is something about the hypnotic sound of so many creatures peeping and chirping on that is amazingly hard to break away from. You just end up staring at them almost in a trance, as they peck around their litter, lay around and generally do nothing all too interesting. But you just can't look away.
That being said, today the chicks did the most endearing thing I have ever witnessed any chicks do.
I was squatting down in their pen, scooping them feed as I do every morning. A few of the most brazen chicks always come over to me during this activity, so that they can get the first “peckins” of feed when I set the freshly renewed feeders down.
But today was different for these brave little hens, because today I was wearing pants that had loose draw strings on them. One of the chicks spotted the dangling string while I was scooping feed and this particular little chick latched on to that string and pulled as hard as she could. She held on tight and relentlessly. It was adorable. Soon, a few other chicks caught on to what was going on and wanted in on this delectable looking string.
The first chick now growing weary of pulling, let go. Sending the string flying. The other chicks rushed in to grab the now loose and bouncing string. The few chicks fought over the string in a sort of tug o' war and finally a “winner” emerged. The winner, now had her turn at doing the exact same thing as the first chick which was steadily pulling back and hoping that the string would give-in so that she could consume her well earned prize.
Well, this exact same exchange went on for a few minutes and finally it was time for me to move on to the goat barn to check for new baby goats. Before I could leave, I had to pick up the latched on chick and remove the cord from said chick's mouth, which was really more difficult then I could have imagined. Finally after chick was removed, I stood up. But this particular chick was not so ready to give up the fight. She watched that string rise and than made a mighty leap to grab the string in mid air. She missed it and tried again but alas the cord was out of her reach and she went back to pecking at her chick feed.

Often I find most people aren't too interested in Chickens, but I for one do not believe I will ever grow tired of the antics and benefits of the flock and I can not imagine a life without my feathered friends.

The Gavilan Trading Post Etsy shop is now up and running.

It has been a beautiful winter so far, cold and quiet with lots of snow, blue skies and plenty of sunshine. We managed to shut down all but two houses for the winter and we are currently running on minimal man power as there is about four of us here at the moment. As it happens, this works out okay because although the outside work is really tough in the deep cold snow it is generally not very time consuming.

We are still trying to cope with the loss of our natural gas last spring, we have converted all heating to wood and have been running the stove/oven on propane. Can't wait to get those alternative energy construction projects underway!

We start combing our Cashmere goats on the 10th of this month. This process takes about three week, each goat takes two to four hours to comb out completely, we comb about five to eight goats a day and have around 110 goats to comb. It is very labor intensive! Luckily we always end up with volunteers that want to work and learn the trade in return for room and board. We love having the volunteers for their good company and enthusiasm for the goats, we could not do it without their help.

We would like to say thank you to everyone that supported the ranch in 2009 by volunteering, partying, inquiring, funding and for just being here. We love you all and wish you all a happy new year!

-Danielle

I have added some pictures to both the Dairy and Cashmere goat folders. Hoping to have some goat pages for goat promotion very soon.

The ranch is very cold and wet today, Hoping to see the sun again soon!

So much to write and little time to do so.

-Danielle

We have new additions to the dairy goat herd!
First is "Nash" a light brown LaMancha/Nubian cross (LaNube). He is a strapping young man and as expected his LaMancha mother "Sally" hates him, luckily she will allow him to nurse if we hold her collar, not without trying to take a few nips at him of course. I think he may be growing on her though.
Second is Pepper, a shy, vocal, black LaNube out of Verbana LaMancha. Not as expected Verbana loves her new daughter!
Third and Forth are two purebred Nubian doelings out of the fabulous "Farewell Angelina". They are big, pretty, light brown and really sweet. Angelina is taking good care of these lovely ladies. We will try to have names for these two by the end of the week.
UPDATE, MORE KIDS!
"Sweet Genvieve" had two lovely purebred Nubian daughters. A big black girl, and a tiny brown girl. Eve is only really liking the big baby but we are hoping she will come around to liking the other one too. The brown baby has had a hard time and we almost lost her but she is starting jump and run with the other kids now.
"Tre Tap's Delightful" had a huge brown purebred Nubian buckling. We have named him "King".
"Geneva De Gavilan" had two very pretty half Alpine half Nubian kids. One boy one girl. The girl will be an awesome milker.
Kidding season is now wrapped up however we will be expecting a few late summer kids! I hope to add some photos of our new arrivals soon!

-Danielle
p.s All kids are by Big Brown (Spirit's Rest Ramblin Boy x Agape Cedar's Hannah)

Green is the color taking over the land, which means spring is here! We still have a few more snow storms to get though by the looks of it, but snow should soon be giving way to rain and we hope to see lot's more green in the coming months.

We have already had a few WWOOFers this spring helping with projects and we are so grateful they are here!
The yard fence is well under way thanks to Jacob and WWOOFer Matt. This fence will provide an animal free zone for people and plants. Hooray!
WWOOFer Sascha has appointed himself as ranch poop-smith and has been hard at work cleaning the winter's build up of horse/cow/goat manure. This manure will go into the garden and provide lot's of good fertilizer for the plants.
The Green house project has been worked on, and various other small projects are being picked up as the weather warms up.
More updates coming soon and pictures to come tonight!

-Danielle

I've installed a new shopping cart system that seems to work well, also working on getting the product pages up and running again.

There is also some reorganization going on with the site itself. The menus will all make sense soon.

Projected Spring Projects 2009 (For volunteers and other interested parties)

Goat fences need to be built on the east, south, and north borders of the property. This would mostly be wire stretching as existing posts are already in place, with only a few needing to be replaced. That’s about 1 2/3 mile of fencing. Also some cross fencing for horses may be in order as well as fencing the upper field (about 100 acres). Also, various border fence repairs are needed. We are hoping to have enough existing materials for this project; if not some fence fund raising may be in order.

The Ranch entry is in shambles and needs to be gussied up. This would include putting in posts for the entry/gaits as well as building some wooden fencing about 100’ or so for aesthetic value as well as to keep goats/horses/cattle off the highway.

The Gavilan trading post needs to have remaining “good junk” (Doors, windows, sinks, cupboards, etc) taken out, which may include building a small out building to hold said “good junk”. We will then need to start repairs on walls and floors. We will be trying to get funding and expertise on this project, so more updates to come on this project as we learn more. Do you know of any organization or person(s) that could help? Let us know. The overall goal for the Trading post, beyond making sure the beautiful building is preserved is to have a General Store and Art studio to help generate money for the ranch and to stimulate local economy in Gavilan/Lindrith area.

Orchard fence built, area cleaned up and prepped for fall tree planting. Location of Orchard is currently being discussed.

The Garden is a huge project that will include lots of soil prep, fence repair, weeding and plant starting. We need a good crop this year so lots of hands and love for the plants is needed. Also need to have a better Compost piles system established and cared for.

Water collection systems are in order, especially for a successful garden as water usage is always an issue. This will be a lot of gutter installation on all those huge tin roofs, possible canals built, and storage areas set up. Some brain storming will be needed for this one.