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Par5livestock farm is located in the Appalachian Foothills of North  Central Alabama.   We are small family farm with approximately 140 acres  of rolling grass covered hillsides and steep wooded ravines.   My  parents bought this farm in 1976 and I grew up here.  We raised cattle,  occasionally goats and some hogs. I moved back to the farm after  college, yet still work full time off farm as well.  I have had sheep  here continually since I was 15 (1988) and goats off and on since 1998.   I have also had a variety of hogs for most of the last ten years.  I  started raising donkeys a few years ago to help control predators.
My  late wife Christy (Cancer 2010) and I have three children and that is  where the Par 5 name came from.  Since p a r happens to  be the first  three letters of our last name, there were five of us and Par5 is the  best of the best in its context, I thought it would fit well.  Our  oldest child (Sara) is 24.  She works full time since she finished her  degree at Mississippi State University and takes care of her own family.  She is a hard worker and a very intelligent and capable young lady.   Our boys (Will and Tom) are 17 year old identical twins who have done  very well academically and get to help with many of the farm chores.   They have shown lambs and hogs since they were four and we have traveled  far and wide with them and their livestock.  Today they have more  things to keep them occupied (Varsity Cross Country, Math team, Scholars  Bowl etc.) and our showing has been cut short. 
​2016 brought many  changes.  I got remarried in February and my  wife Yarah has been  selling our locally raised products at a few local farmers markets.  She  has two daughters, Katya and Dasha who are 10 and 7 respectively and I  hope we will soon be back to showing some form of livestock locally at  least.  Yarah had her own farm and as of 9-11-16 we have a new daughter,  Anastasia to keep us busy (Not that two farms and the older kids were  not enough, LOL).  Life has been hectic to say the least and I think  that we are all looking forward fall weather and taking a few days to  catch our breath and enjoy our growing family.
I also serve on the  Alabama's Meat Goat and Sheep Committee and was the state representative  to the American Sheep Industry Association (ASI) until I was elected to  the Executive Board for ASI.  I was alsp on the board of directors for a  small local marketing Cooperative.  Professionally, I am the statewide  livestock nutritionist for the Alabama Farmers Cooperative.  Needless to  say, I stay busy but I enjoy all that I do and all of it revolves  around Agriculture and now that you know more about us than you probably  wanted to know; on to the other important things.

As mentioned above, I have had a flock of sheep since 1988.  Flock size  has varied over the years from less than twenty ewes to over two  hundred.  We have gone through a variety of breeds and commercial  sheep.  I have tried the hair sheep that are so popular in our area but  soon made my way back to the wooled breeds.  Many think that our  environment is much better suited to hair sheep but in all reality it is  tough on small ruminants in general and our management practices have  to reflect that.  In 2004 I decided to try the Horned Dorset and they  have been my mainstay ever since.  They are a hardy breed with great  maternal traits and grow fast enough to out perform most anything else  in this part of the world, especially the purebred hairsheep.  A couple  of years ago we added some Scottish Blackface ewes and a ram.  They are  an experiment and it will take a year or two before I decide how well  they will work.  I do love their close flocking nature and they are said  to be extremely hardy so I have high expectations for them.  I have  also added a small flock of registered Hampshire ewes and will soon pick  up a ram to compliment them.  Breeding season will surely be a juggling  act and lambing season should be super fun with the different breeds  and types that we have.

We had goats here on the farm just to help with brush control when I was  young.  Predators were a constant battle and soon my Dad tired of the  fight.  I got back into goats during my college years and have had them  pretty much ever since.  I started with Nubians and milked a few while  in college.  I did go through a boar/meat goat phase (along with  everyone else) in the 90s but soon decided that was not what I needed.  I  picked up and enjoyed some Saanen does during the early 2000s but  decided to sell them out when time was an issue due to my late wife's  cancer.  I have since added a mixture of milk does back (Saanen, Nubian,  Alpine, and Lamancha) and milked nine does for a good part of 2014.   Again, time constraints have caused me to revamp my management practices  so I dispersed most of the goat herd.  I will keep the best of the  Nubians (Four our five of my favorites and a young buckling that I just  got) and a couple of Saanens and the rest went to other farms.  2016 and  the changes we made caused us to rethink our goat herds.  We will be  keeping most of the goats at Yarah's farm and will maintain  a few milkers (Mostly saanens and nubians) and a few boer cross meat  type does to produce wethers for the farmers market.

Hogs were an integral part of most farms in this area up until the late  1970s.  People got away from them and we did too.  My first job after  college was managing a contract finishing operation in Mississippi and I  finished just under 24000 head in the year and a half I was there.   After I moved back home, I decided to get a couple of sows and we raised  pigs for three of four years.  Lack of time and facilities soon got the  best of us and we sold out.  In 2004 I let a local AgriScience teacher  talk me into getting two gilts for the boys to show.  After show season,  I AI'd one of the gilts and were back In the business.  I enjoy the  show pigs and we have had fair success with that.  Lately I have kept  one or two sows to produce show pigs and a wide variety of crossbred  pasture type (heritage crosses) to hit other markets.  I have a wide  range of genetics and can produce pigs that will perform well on pasture  or pigs that function in a more intensively managed environment.  We  have tried a variety of breeds and all of our 2016 pigs were sired  by Berkshires.  I don't get along well with the Berkshire hogs that we  have and that line will be dispersed.  The red wattle genetics that we  have used widely this year will also be leaving I think.  I have  recently added two duroc gilts, two Yorkshire gilts and a Hampshire boar  that are from some really old, pasture type bloodlines.  They have been  selected since the 70s and 80s to have a higher quality, better  marbling traits that should produce a superior eating experience and  their attitudes and disposition fit my personality better.  Each of  these animals are extremely line bred and when we cross those lines, I  expect tremendous results.

 I got my first Border Collie  when I was sixteen.  I have continually had them ever since.  I have  had some really good dogs and some that were only fair at best, but  generally I have found that anytime a dog didn't turn out as good as  I thought they should, it was because I didn't spend the time needed  to help them get there.  They are special animals and I don't intend to  do without one.  I have made some great friends over the years  dealing with the stock dog people and hope to one day go back to  attending some of the dog trials.

We bought a handful of bull and heifer calves in the fall of 2016.  Two  or maybe three of the heifers will be kept to raise calves and the rest  will find their way to the processor as they grow and finish.  In the  summer of 2017, we also added two Jersey cows and a Jersey heifer.  The  two cows calved in September  and are currently raising crossbred calves  and being milked.  Fresh milk and butter will be available.  I will  breed these Jerseys back to a bull that i have picked out in an effort  to raise cattle that will milk and marble and eventually we will have  some special steaks with a crossbred steer that will be unique to our  farm