Rest Feeds the Cow, Not the Romance: What I Learned on Justin Rhodes’ Farm
Ryan’s dawn tour of Justin Rhodes’ farm revealed why rotational grazing works, why raw milk is safe in the right hands, and why the “why” matters more than the work.
I’ve watched Justin Rhodes on YouTube for years. His farm tours always look so smooth, so steady, so inspiring — two seconds of a cow in clover, a quick cut of frothy raw milk in a stainless bucket. But standing there with him in the mountains of North Carolina at 6:30 in the morning, I realized just how much those two seconds leave out.
Because milking a cow isn’t two seconds. It’s thirty minutes, minimum. It’s a fence line to check, a stubborn calf to move, a bucket to clean, hands to wash, a filter to run the milk through. And the difference between watching and working is the same difference between romance and reality.
Why Do It At All?
At one point in the tour, Justin stopped and asked a question that hung in the cool air: Why are we even doing this?
Because if you measure only in dollars, it often doesn’t add up. Buying organic feed for backyard chickens can cost more per egg than buying the same carton from Whole Foods. Raising your own milk cow (the fencing, the feed, the training) can be more expensive than buying raw milk from a farmer who’s already doing it well.
But the visitor he was training that day answered it best: “Because you have to.”
If you want the healthiest food for your family, you don’t always do it because it’s cheaper. You do it because the ledger isn’t only money. It’s health. It’s sovereignty. It’s culture. It’s a living education for your children.
The Pasture Writes Its Own Rules
Walking his 75 acres, Justin explained his grazing system with the kind of clarity that only comes from years of watching grass recover.
Wait for the seed-head: When about 20% of clover flowers have gone to seed, it’s the signal to move cows back in. Too early, and you steal the plant’s energy for regrowth. Too late, and you lose protein value.
Short graze, long rest: The magic isn’t in the cow; it’s in the recovery window. Hit a paddock hard and fast, then let it rest 60+ days.
Multi-species partnership: Cows don’t eat multiflora rose, but sheep will. What’s a “weed” for one is breakfast for another.
Mow as compost accelerator: A cheap mow after sheep turns lignin-heavy stalks into quick carbon cycling. As Justin put it: “That’s the cheapest fertilizer you’ll ever use.”
This is not theory. It’s a simple dance of timing and discipline. And it works — even on his 30% slopes where the textbooks say you can’t graze.
Raw Milk, Real Work
I grew up drinking pasteurized skim milk from the store. Thin, flavorless, sold as “healthy.” Watching fresh Jersey milk stream through a filter, warm from the udder, was a jolt.
The hygiene protocol was clear and strict:
Healthy animals, clean udders.
Stainless gear, clean hands.
Filter out hair and dust.
Rapid chill to safe temps.
As Justin reminded me, the danger isn’t in the milk itself — it’s in manure contaminating the milk. And that truth makes you rethink the whole industrial food system. It’s not the cow. It’s the how.
Burnout and the Bigger Why
Homesteading is romanticized online. Instagram makes it look like a lifestyle brand. YouTube cuts the milking down to a montage. But the reality is repetitive, muddy, slow. That’s why so many people who started “COVID gardens” abandoned them once fear wore off. Adrenaline is a terrible long-term fuel.
Justin’s take was bracing: “You’re going to quit at the burnout at seven years? No, you have to go 20 years.”
The only thing that carries you through is vision — a reason bigger than mud, fences, and rain. For him, it’s grandchildren he hasn’t even met yet. For me, it was the realization that the work itself makes the land better for whoever comes after.
Legacy in the Land
This farm has been in his family since the 1930s. His grandfather bought it for $500 — 75 acres and a house without running water. Today, the value isn’t in the market price, but in the continuity. Working the same soil that your father did, worrying about the same soil he did, cursing the same fence lines, but also sharing the same foggy mornings.
That’s not nostalgia. That’s culture. And it’s one worth protecting.
What I Carried Home
Rest feeds the cow more than the cow feeds herself.
Clean handling makes raw milk safe.
Weeds are not weeds if you own sheep.
Cheap “fertilizer” is just mowing at the right time.
Your why must outlast your adrenaline.
Thank you for reading and I hope this inspires you to shake the hand that feeds you.
Viva La Regenaissance!
-Ryan