Ep. 25 Homestead Update & Government Fishing Expedition

A government agency showed up on my property without a warrant, without consent, and without an order and I can’t just shrug that off. After a week packed with normal homestead chaos, that moment is the one still sitting heavy on my chest, because property rights and boundaries are not optional out here, especially for small farms and raw milk herd shares. 

Before we get to the serious part, I’m also sharing the real day-to-day: why I’m investing in learning ChatGPT as a tool for my farm business, how I’m trying to build better systems instead of living off sticky notes, and why I’d rather support a friend’s small business than click a couple buttons at a big box store. We talk chicken processing and what it teaches you about stewardship, the difference between a kitchen garden and a preservation garden, and why May means strawberry preserving season with jam, freeze-dried strawberries, and a kitchen that’s about to get very sticky. 

Then we dig into resilience, especially water security. I’m installing a FloJak manual well pump because water is non-negotiable for the household, the dairy, the cows, the chickens, and the garden. And I share my perspective on the line between lawful oversight and government overreach, why knowing your rights matters, and how food freedom connects to the future of local farms. If you value real food and practical self-reliance, subscribe, share this with a friend, and leave a review so more folks can find the show.

Transcript

Welcome And Week Overview

SPEAKER_01 0:15

Hey y'all, and welcome to Keeping It Real, the Gorham Homestead podcast, where we talk about real food, real natural living, the real art of natural healing, and real life out here in our Tennessee Homestead. I'm your host, Dawn Gorham, and today is May the 4th, 2026. And you are listening to, oh, I think it's episode 25. I'm sorry I forgot to look. Anyway, I'm your host, Dawn Gorham, and this is one of those episodes where I feel like we're just gonna sit down at the kitchen table, pour a cup of coffee, and talk through what real life looks like on the homestead right now. Because let me tell you, this week has been just a little bit of everything. Today, I signed up for a class on learning how to use Chat GPT better for my business. I ordered some Mother's Day gifts for my girls from a friend's small business. The monthly moves letter went out today, and I had to remind folks about herd share subscriptions and why we don't pause or split months. We're processing chickens this weekend. Um, and that'll be first Kale's first batch since becoming part of the Moo crew. So we have got a lot going on. Oh, and we are finally healing and planting the garden. Um, today we are finally getting around to installing our Flow Jack well pump. Thank you, Flow Jack, for sending that to us and being a very, very helpful in that process. I mean, I did pay for it, don't get me wrong, but they were very, very helpful in making sure that I had the right thing. Thinking really hard this year about our water systems and resilience. May for us is strawberry month. So I'll be preserving strawberries every way, but upside down and sideways. And after all of that, I want to talk a little bit about something more serious, which is one of those things that very passionate about, but it's government overreach, property rights, and what happened the day that the Department of Agriculture showed up on my property without a warrant. So buckle up, Buttercup. We have got a lot to cover today.

Learning ChatGPT For Farm Work

SPEAKER_01 2:23

So, first off, a little bit about investing in myself. I talked to you last week about how I was so excited after Nicole's workshop. Came back really energized and jazzed about where I can go and how I can continue to build and where my dairy is going and you know what what my future looks like. And so I signed up for Jack Spearco's Becoming Dangerous with the my I'm getting tongue-tied. Becoming dangerous with Chat GPT. And I know some folks here AI immediately think, like, oh Lord, here we go. The robots are coming. But listen, I don't look at it like that. I look at it like a tool. A hammer can build a house or bust a window. It depends on who's holding it and what they're doing with it. So for me, ChatGPT has become one of those tools that helps me think, it helps me organize, brainstorm, write, plan, market. It helps me to build systems. And at this stage of my life and my business and doing a lot of it by myself, I really need tools that can help me work smarter because I'm already working hard enough as it is. And I work, as I say, I make I work hard enough to make a mule file a complaint. And that's that's a lot. So I want to use AI to help grow my farm business, improve my marketing, organize my thoughts for this podcast, plan newsletters, be better with customer communication, streamline systems, you know, and maybe even help me not have like 47 sticky notes stuck to every surface of my life and writing on the back of my hand because every people have seen pictures of me and they're like, why do you have ink on the back of your hand? I'm like, Yeah, that's my palm pilot. That is where I write things. So, you know, I don't want to do all that with AI. And here's the thing: like, I remember when people talked about Bitcoin years ago and I didn't really understand it. I remember thinking later, like, man, I wish I had paid attention sooner. And I did get in at a decent time. I just didn't have a whole lot to invest in it. I could have done a whole lot more, wish I had. But I'm I'm still in it and I still understand it. And I don't want AI to pass me by sort of like Bitcoin did. And again, not that it has completely passed me by. Bitcoin is still on its way up, but I want to be in on the front end with AI. I don't want to look back five years from now and say, I should have learned when I had the chance. So I signed up and I'm really excited. I want to learn how to use this tool really well. I use it a lot anyway. I don't want to use it in a lazy way, and I don't want to be fake with it, you know, a way a lot of things just have it write everything for you and generate everything for you. I do use it to generate my Dawn on the Farm illustrations that go with my stories. I write the stories, but when I upload the story to ChatGBT, I ask it to create an illustration to go with it. And it works really well for that. I can't draw, so ChatGBT does it for me. I want to build something that's stronger than what I could build on my own because whether we like it or not, the world is changing. And I don't plan on standing in the driveway barefoot, hollering at progress like an angry rooster. I plan to learn it, use it, and make it work for me. So that's one of the things that I've got coming up. That class starts next Monday. Got signed up. I was on the, you know, in the in the little waiting area, watching the clock countdown, wondering if I was going to get in. And I've got friends that have done this class with Jack, and they all just rave about it, how much it has helped them in their business. Letty is in there and she's a big sister in that group. And so she, I'm sure that she will be a wealth of information for me. And I know that she'll help me, you know, in anything that I have questions about. So if you get a chance to take a class like that, it it this one's for entrepreneurs. So if you're building a business, a class like Jack is offering would probably really benefit you. Um, but there's other ones out there. There's it depends on what you're wanting to do with it.

Mother’s Day And Supporting Small Makers

SPEAKER_01 6:40

Another thing that we got, Mother's Day is coming up. Mother's Day is coming up this weekend. Yeah, this weekend. May the 10th, Mother's Day. So I have a friend, her name's Angie Watson of Heartland Designs, and she has a freeze-drying business. And so we were talking at Nicole's over the weekend, and she came up with this really cute idea of doing a chartreatery box, which is a bunch of really cute, like freeze-dried cheesecake and freeze-dried whipped cream with some like flavors on top, just a bunch of cute little freeze-dried treats. And so I ordered those from her. It's a fun little treat box and with sweets and goodies, and I thought it was just the cutest thing. So I decided that I'm going to send those to my daughters for Mother's Day. I don't expect them to send me anything, but they're all, you know, new mothers. They're in the, you know, they're in the trenches. And so I thought getting something from me, you know, just reminding them that they're doing a good job, I thought that would mean a lot to them. So hopefully they'll get those. I think Angie said they were mailed out this morning. They don't listen to me, so they're not, they're not going to know that it's coming. But hopefully it'll be there before Mother's Day. And I love being able to support my friends and small businesses whenever I can. So it made me feel really good, you know, to be able to order that from Heartland Designs from my friend Angie. And I think it's going to be, I think it's going to be something that's really special to him. You know, I could have ordered from a big box store. I could have clicked two buttons and had some generic things show up in a cardboard box with all the personality of a wet paper towel, but that's just not the same. There's something special about buying from somebody you know, somebody who's creating something with their own hands, someone who is trying to build something for their family. And that matters to me. That is part of the community, and it's part of being a part of the community, is supporting the other people who are also, you know, they're they're in the throes of it. They're in the throes of building. I think we need more of that. We need more people who are supporting each other. We need more local business. We need more of I know who made this, and less faceless, soulless, mast-produced everything. So I'm excited for the girls to get those boxes, and I'm excited to support Angie. So hopefully they'll all be really happy. I really wanted to send one to my daughter-in-law too, but she's not a mother yet, and I really didn't know how she would take it. Like maybe I was trying to overly encourage her. So I'll probably send her something later just as a hey, I love you and thinking about you kind of thing.

Why Herd Shares Cannot Pause

SPEAKER_01 9:29

Uh so next on the list is the monthly Moose letter. And I sent that out today. Now, in the in the Moose letter, I had to remind some folks of something that is not always fun to say, but it had to be said. I'm not able to pause herd share herd share subscriptions or split months so that people can travel. Um, I know that can be frustrating for people, and I understand that people go on vacation. I understand life happens, and I understand that schedules get busy, but here's the reality: the cows do not stop eating because somebody went to the beach. They don't gather up in the barn and say, Well, the Swiss Smith family's headed to Florida this week, so we'll just skip feed and utilities until they get back. No, ma'am, that is not how this works. The feed bill still comes, the labor still happens, the milking still happens, the testing still happens, the jars still have to be washed, the chill tank still has to be run, and the dairy still has to be maintained. This is a leaving, living, breathing operation. And the herd share is not just paying for milk in a bottle, it is helping maintain the herd, the dairy, the infrastructure, and the system that makes milk available every single week. So that is why we do the monthly membership. That is why it is consistent, that is why we don't pause, split, or prorate months. And I don't say that to be mean. I'm really not. I say it because I have to protect myself. And if I don't protect the sustainability of this dairy, then I won't have dairy to offer anybody. I'm gonna go out of business. And so I have to stick to those rules. And sometimes running a business means having boundaries. And I'll be honest, that does not always come naturally to me. I have a big heart, I want to help people, but I've had to learn that if you let everybody's exception become your responsibility, you will run yourself right into the ground. And I'm not doing that. I've worked too hard, I can't do it. Not anymore. This farm has to be sustainable for my family, for the cows, and for all the members who depend on us. And I'll just say I still have not taken a single draw off of what comes in from the dairy yet. Everything has gone back into infrastructure, to the cows, to things that the the farm needs, that this, you know, for maintaining this building. None of it has gone to the house. So please understand that I'm running on very thin margins. I would have loved to eventually be profitable when I get, you know, the equipment and all of the things that came with this paid off. But, you know, as it stands right now, I have to stick to the rules for that reason.

Chicken Processing And Food Respect

SPEAKER_01 12:34

Another exciting thing that we have going on is chicken processing. Chicken processing is coming up this weekend. Kale is going to be processing them. We'll probably help him if we can. It's his first batch since becoming part of the MOO crew. And very excited because chicken processing is one of those real homestead skills that teaches you fast. You can watch videos all day long, you can read books, you can talk about food systems and self-reliance until the cows come home. But when you're standing there processing chickens, you understand food in a whole different way. And there is respect that comes with that. It's not just a package from the grocery store, it's not just a price tag, it's not just meat wrapped up in plastic. It is life, it is work, it is responsibility, and it's stewardship. And I think that's one of those things missing in our modern food system. People are so far removed from where their food comes from that they don't even think about it anymore. They just grab that boneless, skinless breast from the store like they were grown on a styrofoam tree somewhere. And that's what they think. But out here we know better. We know what goes into raising them, we know what goes into feeding them, we know what goes into processing them, and we know what we know what it means to put real food in the freezer. So this weekend will be a big one, and we have 150 chickens. I don't think we're gonna process all of them this weekend. I've sort of letting him drive that bus. So whatever he decides to do is what we'll do. But I'm excited that he is finally getting his business off the ground because I have put him in charge of poultry, and that's one of the things that's gonna be his money maker. So I'm I'm happy that we are finally to that first processing weekend.

Garden Reality Versus Garden Plans

SPEAKER_01 14:29

The other things that we have going on, we have garden projects that we must finish. Oh Lord, we must finish. We're working on the garden this week. We're finally healing and planting the garden. And yes, I'm a little bit later than I wanted to be, but I'm not gonna sweat it too much. At some point, you just kind of have to accept that real life does not always line up with the pretty little garden calendar that you made when you were sitting inside in January drinking coffee and feeling really optimistic. January, January me, the me who is sitting there with my coffee and my seed catalogs and my garden planner, is always very ambitious. Very ambitious. January me thinks that Mamie is going to be organized, rested, and wearing a cute little apron while gently placing seeds into perfect soil. Mamie is out here sweating, running behind, looking for tools, answering customer messages, checking milk, dealing with animals, and wondering who moved my gloves, and blaming everybody, including Kale. So we're planting now, and that's just fine. It is what it is. My kitchen garden is planted and ready to roll. I'm happy about that. That feels good. The kitchen garden is the one that's close to the house. It's the one for fresh eating, for herbs, for quick harvests. You know, those things that I want to just run out and grab while I'm cooking. But the preservation garden, the big garden, is still a work in progress. And those are two very different animals. A kitchen garden feeds your table, a preservation garden feeds your pantry. So the preservation garden is the one that matters when you are thinking about jars on the shelf, freezer space, freeze drying, canning, dehydrating, and getting through the winter with the food that you grew yourself. That garden takes planning, it takes volume, and it takes intention. So we're working on it. We're getting there. It might not be as early as I wanted, but it is happening. And that's the thing about homesteading. You don't get to wait for perfect conditions. You just do the next right thing, and you do it when you can. So that is we're working on that. And hopefully, T's going to get home early today, and that is going to be on our docket. We are all going to be over there, Chase, T, Kale, and trying to get those heels, you know, or get everything healed up, get the plastic down, and all that good stuff. We are finally installing the Flow Jack well pump.

Flowjack Pump And Water Backups

SPEAKER_01 17:12

I have been wanting the Flowjack since I met them at Self-Reliance Festival and kind of got that on my radar, that it was a manual way to get water up out of the ground when other things aren't working. And I like to have backups to my backups. I mean, we do have the generac generator. So that'll run our well pump if we don't have electricity. But what happens if that's not working? So, and and the well is up on a hill. So if we could crank some water out of that thing with the hand crank, then we can get water going downhill and we would be in really good shape. So my neighbor Brent, I love him, he's coming over. He's a plumber by trade, although I don't think he's more in management now, but he still knows how to do all the stuff. But he's coming over and we're gonna get that put together and drop down into the well this evening. And I cannot even tell you what peace of mind that gives me. Water has been one of my main focuses this year because you can have freezers full of food, shelves full of jars, you know, gardens planted, animals out on pasture, all the good intentions of the world. But if you don't have water, you've got a serious problem. And we realize that even more during the ice storm this year. Water is not optional. You can skip a lot of things, you can make do without a lot of comforts, you can cook outside, you can light candles, you can wear extra clothes, you can eat simple, but you cannot go without water. And I just don't have myself to think about. You know, I have cows and I have chickens and poultry, I have animals, I have a garden, I have a dairy, I have a household. So having a manual well pump gives me a level of peace that is worthy of every last bit of effort that we're putting into it. And I don't want to be completely dependent on power to access water. That just doesn't sit well with me. And this year we're working on adding some additional water storage, some water catchment, and some water access in as many areas as possible. I want options, I want backup systems, I want redundancy. Because as Jack always says, one is none, two is one. And when it comes to water, I prefer three, four, five, six, if possible. We're also looking at our spring-fed pond. We would really like to find someone who can help revitalize it. The springhead needs some love, and I know there's some really good potential there. It used to be a pretty full spring-fed pond, and over the years, I think just some sediment has gotten in the spring head. So it just doesn't feel like it did. But that pond could be such a valuable resource if we can get it cleaned up and get it functioning the way that it should. Excuse me. So water is a big theme around here this year. Wells, pumps, storage, catchment, ponds, access points, like all of it. Anything that I can do to install more water options, I'm doing it this year. Because for me, peace of mind is not built by accident. We build it around here one system at a time.

Strawberry Preserving Season Begins

SPEAKER_01 20:34

May is strawberry month. My favorite month. Um a strawberry nut. My mother says I was cooked on strawberries because she ate strawberry ice cream the entire time she was pregnant with me. Strawberry whatever, whatever she could get her hands on that was strawberries, she ate it. And I have been a strawberry fiend my whole life. So over the next two weeks, I'm going to be preserving strawberries in as many forms as possible. I'm talking strawberry jam, freeze-dried strawberries, strawberries for yogurt, strawberries for ice cream, frozen berries, whatever else I can come up with. And once I'm knee deep in flats and questioning my life choices, I will be thinking, I love this life because that's how preserving works. You start out all excited, like, oh, look at these beautiful strawberries. And then three hours, three hours later, your kitchen looks like a crime scene from jam-related incident. Every towel is sticky, your feet hurt, and you're wondering why you thought 10 flats was a reasonable number. I do it to myself every year. But then winter comes and you open a jar of homemade strawberry jam, or you pull out freeze dried strawberries, or you make ice cream with berries that you preserved yourself, and suddenly you're like, oh yeah, that's why I did this. This is pretty awesome. I did plant strawberries in my raised bed this year up by my kitchen garden. And I'm happy that I did that. It's the first year for them. They're not going to produce anywhere near what I need for preserving. Not for jam, not for freeze drying, any of that stuff. All the things that we use strawberries for. So I will be going to my local strawberry farmer and purchasing about 10 flats. And I love that. I love to support other farmers whenever possible. There is this idea sometimes that if you're a homesteader, you should like grow every single thing yourself. And I just don't think that that's realistic for most people. I mean, could I eventually grow more strawberries? Sure. But right now, I know a local farmer who's already growing beautiful strawberries and growing them the way that I would grow them. And I'm happy to support them. Again, eventually I'm going to have my own strawberries. But this is part of building a local food system. It's not just about me growing food, it's about our neighbors, our other local farmers, producers, and families who support each other. I grow what I can, I preserve what I can, and when I need more, I support another farmer. And that's how it should be.

Property Rights And Agency Overreach

SPEAKER_01 23:21

Now, after all these updates, I want to shift gears just one last little bit because I want to talk about something that's been weighing on me. And I'm not going to go super deep into detail about it right now, but I do want to talk just a hair about the day that the Department of Agriculture showed up on my property and what happened. I'm going to be careful how I say this because I want to be clear and factual. But from my perspective, they trespassed on my property when they showed up without a warrant and searched my property. There was no warrant, there was no administrative order, and there was no consent. I did not invite them to come and search my property. And I don't believe that what they did was right. Now listen, I am not saying this because I want to be dramatic. I'm not trying to stir up trouble just for the sake of stirring up trouble. I've got enough trouble around here just trying to keep animals fed and milk cold and gardens planted and chickens from acting like little tiny feathered criminals. But I do think this matters. It matters because property rights matter. It matters because boundaries matter. It matters because small farms matter. And it matters because people have a right to know what is happening when government agencies show up and act like they can just do whatever they want. There's a difference between lawful oversight and government overreach. There is a difference between asking questions and unlawfully searching a person's property. There is a difference between doing your job and crossing a line. And I believe wholeheartedly that the line was crossed. Now I'm not telling people to be hateful and I'm not telling people to go out and be confrontational. I'm not saying you need to act like a wet hen every time someone with a clipboard shows up. But I am saying that you need to know your rights. You need to know what you are required to do and what you are not required to do. You need to understand where your property begins, where your consent matters, and what the government can and cannot do. Because authority does not automatically equal permission. And a title does not erase your rights. There is something more people need to understand. We have gotten so used to assuming that if someone from an agency says something, then it must be law. That's not always the case. Sometimes it's policy, sometimes it's interpretation, sometimes it's intimidation. Sometimes those people are just on a power trip. And sometimes it's just somebody hoping that you don't know the difference, that you don't know what your rights are. That's why education matters. That's why documentation matters. That's why staying calm matters. You don't have to be rude, you don't have to be ugly, and you don't have to lose your head, but you do need to be firm. Because if you don't know where your boundaries are, somebody else will be more than happy to move them for you. And this connects to something bigger for me. It connects to people's right to choose their food. It connects to raw milk. It connects to small farms. It connects to herd shares. It connects to whether families have the right to decide what they put in their own bodies. Because at the end of the day, I believe people have the right to eat the foods of their choosing. I believe people have the right to seek out real food. I believe people have the right to know their farmers, shake their hand, walk the land, ask questions, and make informed decisions for their own families. And I believe that right should not disappear just because the food doesn't fit neatly into the industrial food system. Now I'd probably be diving more into all of this in an upcoming episode because there is a lot to say and a lot to unpack. Government overreach, food freedom, property rights, small farms, herd shares, those are big topics. And they are very controversial and very hot topics. And they matter. They matter for us. They matter for our children. They matter for our grandchildren. They matter for the future of food in this country. Because if we lose the right to choose our food, we lose a whole lot more than what's just what's on the dinner plate.

Weekly Wrap Up And Next Steps

SPEAKER_01 28:11

So when I look at this week, it really does show what life on this homestead is all about. We are learning new skills with AI. We are supporting small businesses and local farmers. We're setting boundaries. We are processing chickens and putting real food in the freezer. We are planting gardens, even if we're a little bit behind. We are building water resilience with the Flowjack Pump as our starter for this week. We are preparing for strawberry preservation season, and we are standing firm on property rights and food freedom. That's real life. It's not always pretty. And it's certainly not always easy. It's not always wrapped up with a pretty little bow. Sometimes it's muddy boots, sticky counters, hard conversations, government agencies, chicken processing, and trying to remember where you set your coffee down. But it's real. And that is what this podcast is supposed to be. That's what I want it to be. I want it to be about real food, about real natural living and real life out here on our Tennessee homestead. All right, so we're gonna wrap this up. I hope that you have enjoyed our topic for today. I will probably be diving more into the government overreach and people's right to eat foods of their choosing in an upcoming episode. But to my babies and grandbabies, I love you big. I hope you hear this someday. Whatever y'all have on the docket today, guys, just remember to keep it real. I'll see you next week.

Closing Words And Outro Music

SPEAKER_00 30:00

My daddy was a carpet playing all the local clubs. And my mama was a woman with a puppet making with a cup. We didn't have much money.