AislingQuoy is a smallholding  in the beautiful rolling downs of North Canterbury. Our aim is self sufficiency without the unnecessary use of chemicals. We grow our own vegetables, and raise animals for eggs, milk and meat.



​Animals

We keep goats, sheep, pigs, and poultry and have a pet dog and a farm cat. They all have important roles in the daily life of the farm and are all very well socialised and easy to handle. They enjoy human company - especially if you'll scratch their backs or rub their bellies! Our primary focus is goats and we are aiming to breed excellent dairy goats.

 

The goats are dairy goats, mainly British Alpine and British Alpine / Toggenburg cross. They usually have babies in September / October and we sharemilk. That means the mums raise the kids themselves and provide all the milk and we take the leftover. The kids stay with mum fulltime till they are 4 weeks old then are separated overnight, we milk in the morning and the kids spend the day with mum learning to be a goat.The raw milk is used to make our own cheese as well as for drinking.

 

 

​The sheep are a mix of dairy and meat sheep. We do shear and use wool but the primary purpose is for meat. Meat sheep are the offspring of dairy sheep crossed with a meat breed or orpan lambs from nearby farms which we bottle raise. There are usually lambs to be bottle fed from September until January.

 

Produce

We produce all our own vegetables and a lot of scraps for the goats, pigs and chickens. We try to run a low till garden – meaning we dig and disturb the soil as little as possible. The garden is set up in a rotational keyhole bed system which maximizes easy access planting areas.  We practice companion planting as much as possible and plant by the moon.

 

Eggs

Chicken, Duck and Goose eggs have progressively richer flavours. We sell chicken eggs which helps pay for all the grain they eat.

 

​​Meat

We home kill all our own meat and butcher and process it ourselves. Humane death is critically important to us, the animal very rarely ever know anything is happening to them until they are dead. We eat pork and its associates, bacon, ham, sausage etc, lamb, goat, chicken, duck, and goose.

 

​Fruit and nuts

A couple of walnuts, hazelnuts and almonds each year is all we’ve managed so far and a handful of olives. The harvests should increase over the years. The orchard should start producing a few apples, apricots, plums and pears this year. The Feijoas produce well when the chickens don’t eat all the flowers. At the moment the harvest is still small so has just been made into aperitifs.

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For more pictures have a look at our gallery