• Lord of the manor…

    TDA Churchill was the first bull we developed in our pure English Devon project and we now have about a dozen of his progeny in our herd. Churchill’s dam was the best Devon cow we ever saw.  She was national grand champion three years running until her breeder, Gavin Hunter of Tilbrook  Grange, took pity on other English breeders and stopped showing her. Just as impressive…for four straight years her sons (Churchill’s brothers) topped the national Devon show auctions. We’ll always be grateful that Gavin shared Cashtiller with Thistle Hill. Cashtiller grandsons and granddaughters are available for inspection at our Farm. David

  • The Radical Homemaker…

    …is the pen name for Shannon Hayes. She was born and raised on a grass fed Milking Devon farm in upstate New York. Back in the day Shannon’s father was an inspiration to many of us getting started in this grass fed business. Shannon and her husband and children have long since joined her parents on the farm and expanded their operation into a store and cafe and market other farm products. Meanwhile Shannon has become an author with several books to her credit including “The Grassfed Gourmet Cookbook”. All this is by way of recommending one of her recent blogs on the “mis-steaks” of cooking grass fed beef. David

  • This isn’t all that bad…

    ….one of the mainstays of our herd, T2, interrupts her grazing after the first snowstorm of the season. As you can tell by her nose, she had no difficulty burrowing though the snow to get at grass. (There’s hay nearby, if she wants it.) Officially we had six inches of snow overnight though not quite that in this pasture. T2 is a Rotokawa 93 sired cow out of our R2. She is our template for a perfect Devon cow and we feel she holds her own even against our imported traditional English Devon. David

  • Meat alert…

    Here’s just a sample of what you’ve been missing if you’ve been waiting to try Thistle Hill beef. This roast was slow cooked in Baltimore and our customer said he didn’t even have to use a knife.  Note the interior, tasty fat in the meat. More than half our regulars order a quarter….that’s close to 100 pounds and is priced at $7.50 actual package weight! Others order a half at $7.25. With preference given to the largest orders we seldom have individual cuts for sale; but we urge you to ask. If we get enough requests we can set aside a portion of the next animals. Needless to say (but…