Andreas & Monika Zinn
We are owners and operators of Zinn Farms in Springstein, Manitoba. We began farming together as a mother/son team over fifteen years ago, but have each been farming our entire lives. We love working with animals and direct marketing our products. Our animals have always been raised free-range, with on-farm milled grains, free of preventative antibiotics, GMO grains or growth hormones. Raising our Heritage pigs, meat chickens and layer chickens this way is good for the environment, the animals, the farmer and the final consumer, you! We are working to provide healthy products and improve the environment by following regenerative agriculture principles.
How it works:
1. Make an order
2. Choose a pickup
or delivery location
3. Enjoy
Frequenty Asked Questions
We mill locally grown grains, wheat, barley, oats, peas, hemp as well as minerals. The animals also eat grass, hay and organic vegetables on our farm. We do NOT put preventative antibiotics, growth hormones or GMO grains in the feed.
Heritage pork: We restock products most weeks of the year, check back again shortly.
Chicken: We restock products three times a year, April/May, July and October.
Eggs: We restock throughout the week, check back again shortly.
Looking for more specific dates, send us an email and we can let you know!
Yes! Email us what you are looking for. Turn around time is generally 2-3 weeks.
No
Yes! Email us for our wholesale product list.
Yes, St. Norbert Farmers' Market year round and Wolseley Farmers' Market, South Osbourn Farmers Market, and River Heights Farmers Market during the summer.
Email us at freerange@zinnfarms.com.
Read more to find out what Regenerative Agriculture is and what we are doing on our farm to improve the environment and nutrienty density of our meat and eggs. Â
A system of farming principles and practices that increases biodiversity, enriches soils, improves watersheds, and enhances ecosystems. Regenerative Agriculture aims to capture carbon in soil and plants from the atmosphere.
Limit mechanical, chemical, and physical disturbance of soil. Tillage destroys soil structure. It is constantly tearing apart the “house” that nature builds to protect the living organisms in the soil that create natural soil fertility. The result of tillage is soil erosion, the wasting of a precious natural resource. Synthetic fertilizers, herbicides, pesticides, and fungicides all have negative impacts on life in the soil as well.
On our farm:
- Having animals on pasture eliminates the need for any mechanical tillage.
- We do not use any chemical fertilizers or pesticides on our land.
- We use low disturbance seeders to establish new pasture and hay fields.
Keep soil covered at all times. This is a critical step toward rebuilding soil health. Bare soil is an anomaly—nature always works to cover soil. Providing a natural “coat of armor” protects soil from wind and water erosion while providing food and habitat for macro- and microorganisms. It will also prevent moisture evaporation and germination of weed seeds.
On our farm:
- Moving the pigs daily. Pigs naturally dig in the soil looking for roots, bugs, and other tasty treats. Daily moves provide fresh grass for the animals and a new interesting space to explore and graze. This minimizes soil exposure.
- Perennial plants. Planting pastures and crops that grow over multiples years keeps the soil covered all year, rather than just in the summer months.
- Zero tillage. We do not till our land, which allows natural beneficial bacteria, insects, and small animals to flourish.
Strive for diversity of both plant and animal species. Where in nature does one find monocultures? Only where humans have put them! When you look out over a stretch of native prairie, one of the first things you’ll notice is the incredible diversity. Grasses, forbs, legumes, and shrubs all live and thrive in harmony with each other. Think of what each of these species has to offer. Some have shallow roots, some deep, some fibrous, some tap. Some are high-carbon, some are low-carbon, some are legumes. Each of them plays a role in maintaining soil health. Diversity enhances ecosystem function.
On our farm:
- Planting multiple species and plant types in fields and pastures. Grasses, cereals, legumes, brassicas and chenopod, each playing an important role in soil health.
- Raising different animals. Pigs, meat chickens, layer chickens and rabbits.
- Feeding a variety of grains to our animals. Wheat, barley, oats, flax, sunflower seeds, hemp, etc. Each providing different macro-nutrients, micro-nutrients, protein levels and oil content for a balanced diet. We also source unsellable vegetables from organic grocery stores for even more diversity.
Maintain a living root in soil as long as possible throughout the year. Take a walk in the spring and you will see green plants poking their way through the last of the snow. Follow the same path in late fall or early winter and you will still see green, growing plants, which is a sign of living roots. Those living roots are feeding soil biology by providing its basic food source: carbon. This biology, in turn, fuels the nutrient cycle that feeds plants.
On our farm:
- Using perennials and winter annuals to have a living growing root for the mazimum amount of time. Our short growing season here in Manitoba means we have to use as many frost-free days as possible to feed the soil and our animals.
Integrating livestock onto an operation provides many benefits. The major benefit is that the grazing of plants stimulates the plants to pump more carbon into the soil. It also has a major, positive impact on climate change by cycling more carbon out of the atmosphere and putting it into the soil. And if you want a healthy, functioning ecosystem on your farm, you must provide a home and habitat for not only farm animals but also pollinators, predator insects, earthworms, and all of the microbiology that drive ecosystem function.
On our farm:
- Grazing pigs and chickens allow them to manure directly into the soil, this feeds the soil and decreasing the labour and fuel.
- Practicing no-till does not disturb the land and allows wild insects, bugs and animals to live in and contribute to the health of the farm.
- We are currently establishing new shelter belts that protect our animals from wind. Planting diverse tree, fruit trees and berry bushes also helps feed our family, our farm animals and wild life. Pigs love apples that have fallen from the trees.