Every winter, we (Caitlin) spend a lot of time behind the scenes—deep in paperwork, meetings, and navigating the ever-changing landscape of licensing and regulations required to farm. We work with multiple agencies. Some are voluntary, like MEAEP and Produce Safety Certification. Others—like EGLE, MDARD, and USDA/FSA—are required. It’s part of the job. It’s part of running a modern farm. But this winter, something kept coming up in those rooms that left us unsettled. A lack o

Over the past few weeks, we’ve shared what happened when Northern Michigan lost access to its last licensed poultry processor, the real cost of traveling long distances for processing, and the challenges farms face in rebuilding that infrastructure. So where do we go from here? At Danu Hof, we believe the answer is not just restoring access for one farm, but creating something that can serve our broader community. We are working toward building a small-scale, MDARD-licensed p

Why Small Farms Face Barriers to Building Poultry Processing Facilities After learning that Northern Michigan lost its last licensed poultry processor, many people ask a reasonable question: Why doesn’t another farm simply start processing poultry? The answer is that building and operating a licensed poultry processing facility requires navigating several layers of regulation, infrastructure, and cost. These systems exist for important reasons. Processing facilities handle fo