From Our Family to Yours
Forest-Raised Pork
Rust Hill Ranch pigs are raised in the forest and on pasture. They are offered premium feed in conjunction with free-choice foraging. The pigs can express their natural “rooting” behavior as they consume leaves, grass, acorns, walnuts, insects, worms, and roots. While tilling the soil, they enhance their diet with natural minerals. Our pigs are healthy, happy, and wholesome.
Pasture-Raised Chicken & Eggs
Rust Hill Ranch chickens are raised outdoors in mobile “cathedrals,” with full-time access to fresh air, green leaves, bugs, and sunlight. Each day, they are moved onto a new patch of pasture. Our chickens receive organic, non-GMO feed. They scratch, aerate, and fertilize the soil, and never see the same ground twice during their lifetime. They have a rich flavor that you have to taste to believe.
Grassfed Beef
Grassfed and grass-finished beef and lamb complement the other animals at Rust Hill Ranch. Cattle and sheep are grouped together in a “flerd” (flock + heard). They are rotated onto fresh pasture regularly, which is a regenerative approach to pasture management, maximizing the growth of grasses, legumes, and forbs (colloquially called “weeds”). A diverse pasture allows the animals to obtain balanced nutrition in their diet.
Over 100 years of family farming tradition.
Rust Hill Ranch is the continuation of a family farm legacy established more than a century ago.
Minnesota & Montana.
In 1919, great-grandfather Martin Rustebakke and his brothers took the train from Thief River Falls, Minnesota to Scobey, Montana to establish a homestead. The original farmhouse—pictured above—is still standing.
The first 100 years.
The Rustebakke family has farmed the original homestead land continuously for over 100 years. The land has remained in the family through the roaring 20s, depression, war, and drought.
The next century.
In 2021, Rebecca (Rustebakke) Hardy and her husband Matt established their own regenerative farm & ranch near Franconia, MN. Rust Hill Ranch is named in honor of our ancestors’ original homestead. Rustebakke means “Rust Hill” in Norwegian. We are proud to build on our family’s farming legacy.