Category Archives: mushroom

Celebrating 10 years with 20% off!

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10 YEARS: Half Hill Farm is celebrating 10 years with a huge 20% discount for online purchases! Use coupon code “10YEARS” twice this year on any two orders and get 20% off your order. It’s one way we’re saying THANK YOU for making us your home for better health & well being!

When we first started making our mushroom extracts, we had no idea anyone outside our own family would need it. You surprised us with stories of healing that changed everything! Making our mushroom extracts continues to be a labor of love for all of us here at Half Hill Farm.

You can only use one coupon code at a time. Don’t forget other coupon codes you can use to continue helping you save throughout the year:

  • 4PACK – get 15% off when you order four or more 200ml bottles of our mushroom extracts in any combination.
  • 10FOR20 – get 20% off when you order 10 or more 200ml bottles of our mushroom extracts.
  • intro10 – get 10% off any one order as an introduction to our products!

Half Hill Farm: Celebrating 10 years!

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Christian and Vince (2013) – photo by BrassPenny Photography

10th ANNIVERSARY: All year we are reflecting on ten years of big dreams and big change at Half Hill Farm. A lot can happen in ten years, but one thing is true: life has a way of showing you the path forward in every challenge if your heart and mind are open to it.

We moved to Woodbury from Murfreesboro to build and open Short Mountain Distillery for the Kaufman brothers after helping change county law in 2010 by referendum to allow it. I had just quit my job producing evening news for a local television station in search of something with more meaning and purpose and found way more than I could have imagined.

It took 16 months to build the distillery but not nearly that long to be inspired enough by the community and country living to want to slightly change direction again to start our own farm.

It almost didn’t happen. We looked for months when we saw a “for sale by owner” sign on what appeared to be a heavily wooded property. When we drove up the first part of the driveway, we stopped and looked at each other and said we should leave before seeing anything more. Something about the entrance kept us away for months until we saw a listing that showed what we had missed. Luckily, it was still on the market, and we bought it!

When we moved to our new farm in 2012, a good friend opened our eyes to nature’s possibilities with a surprise find of a giant 9 lbs Maitake mushroom growing at the base of an old oak tree. It moved us toward growing mushrooms, but not nearly as seriously as life had in store.

We started our farm with selling our organic vegetables at our local farmers market, but everything changed when Vince’s mother was diagnosed with stage four lung cancer. The farming side waned as we focused more on mushrooms and what they could do for her.

While her quality of life was dramatically improved, stage four eventually proved too difficult a challenge for Sandy. Her passing was hard, and we almost decided to stop farming when friends who needed our mushroom extracts encouraged us to keep going.

Over time, the word-of-mouth growth in demand for the mushroom extracts we made required us to move to a larger commercial kitchen we invited another new business to share. Very soon after, our new gut healthy beverage took off and we brought on a partner to get bigger space that has grown us into three retail stores.

Despite the growth, we are still based in our small hometown of Woodbury, TN. We are here because of help from a lot of friends and neighbors who believe in our vision. We still make our mushroom extracts with all organic ingredients and a monkish reverence in service to customers who need it. Because of stories of healing and personal transformation from our customers, we personally take the products every single day and will for life.

In the past ten years, we have gone from making our liquid mushroom dual extracts because no one else was to seeing a whole industry grow around what these mushrooms can do for people. We see what some get wrong and what some get right. We see companies making the most of it and companies with the same level of passion for better health & well being.

It’s exciting to see customers’ mushroom consciousness grow no matter how it happens. However you come to use mushrooms in your life, know that the roots of our dedication to better health & well being with mushrooms runs deep and is personal. Thank you for continuing to trust what we do and for choosing our farm’s products!

Shop our mushroom extracts and other products online, or visit our retail stores:

Five Mushrooms Liquid Dual Extract Blend from Half Hill Farm

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Over the years, many of you requested a mushroom extract that blended what you love the most about each of our liquid mushroom dual extracts. And for years we’ve encouraged customers to blend the extracts they love the most in any combination.

As I turn 50 later this year, I feel better than I ever have in my life. Aside from good diet and exercise, taking our liquid mushroom extracts daily for years is my only “secret.” After enjoying a test blend of all five of our mushroom dual extracts daily, I have a new favorite that we are ready to share with you!

Introducing Half Hill Farm’s Five Mushrooms – a mushroom dual extract blend of USDA certified organic and wildcrafted Turkey Tail, Red Reishi, Chaga, Lion’s Mane and Cordyceps mushrooms. This extract combines the unique myco-nutrients of five mushrooms used for centuries to support good health.

Now available through our online store and at our farm’s stores below:

Please consult your doctor if taking any of our products for health reasons. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

 

Take 20% off select essentials in-store and online

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THANK YOU for making our farm your trusted home for better health & well being. It means a lot to us, and we want to express our gratitude with a 20% in-store discount on all our farm’s popular mushroom extracts, apple cider vinegar tonics, kombucha, kefir, hemp products, bitters and other select products – Friday only at the following locations:

Taste Test our new flavor Root Beer Kefir on tap at Wellness Emporium Woodbury and let us know what you think! This American craft soda flavor is made with all organic sarsaparilla, ginger, star anise, birch bark, cherry bark, and wintergreen in our fermented probiotic water kefir.

Won’t be around? Shop online and receive the same automatic discount all weekend (Nov 27 – Nov 30) with free shipping on all orders over $150!

Half Hill Farm’s Mushroom Dual Extracts – new packaging, same quality and care!

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MUSHROOM EXTRACTS: When we created our farm’s popular mushroom dual extracts several years ago, we started by sparing no expense on quality because we created it for a very special member of our family battling cancer. Today, that same focus on quality and care is the reason we’ve grown into what we are today, and we will never forget that!

In a couple weeks, you’ll start seeing our new mushroom extracts packaging that will help customers see and pour the product better. It’s the exact same product made by the same people you love and trust with all the same high quality ingredients our friends and loved ones deserve.

Thank you for trusting us to help keep you on the path to better health and well being!

Purchase Half Hill Farm’s Mushroom Dual Extracts online and save 15% when you buy 4 or more 200ml bottles in any combination using coupon code “4pack.” Save 10% anytime with the one time use code “intro10.”

Read more on Half Hill Farm’s mushroom dual extracts:

Please consult your doctor if taking any of our products for health reasons. These statements have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease.

Turkey Tail mushroom extract and quality of life for dogs with cancer

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Our every day work is a mission to bring hope and healing into the world. We know the science behind what we do, but it’s the “why” part that gets to the deeper purpose and meaning of our work. When we ask what good we can do with our time and talents, we are answered by your heartfelt letters. 

Our almost 12 year old golden girl, Serenity, was diagnosed with hemangiosarcoma of the spleen on Nov. 20, 2018. I was told that we only had a few days left, that is was aggressive, and there was nothing we could do. However, through some research and desperation I came across a study from Penn State in which they had used Turkey Tail mushroom extract on dogs with the same cancer as Serenity’s. After further searching I came across your farm and Turkey Tail product. Fast forward to today and we just received our 2nd order of Turkey Tail extract. We’ve been putting it in Serenity’s food twice a day. She is maintaining, has a great appetite, wants to play and run, and goes on walks several times a day. So, we are feeling thankful that we found your product as well as extremely blessed to still have our Serenity with us and living what we would call a good quality of life. We thought you might enjoy hearing our experience/story.
Sincerely,
Rhonda & Bruce Arney

Serenity’s story is a very common one for us, each with a unique character and name forever etched on the hearts of families who care for them. What we often find with customers who use our Turkey Tail mushroom dual extract for their dogs is improved quality of life and life beyond expectation (months to a year longer than prognosis). The results shared by people fighting cancer are even more remarkable (read reviews).

Turkey Tail mushrooms aren’t a cure for cancer, but your experiences with our product over the past few years have helped validate the growing body of science behind it and opened our eyes to the power of nature to help us rise to any health challenge.

Please consult your doctor before taking any of our products for health reasons. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

GRAND OPENING: Half Hill Farm opens Wellness Emporium in Woodbury

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Half Hill Farm’s new location at 110 West High Street is now open to the public. The Wellness Emporium is next door to DTC and features kombucha, tonics and extracts made with love on site as well as other natural health and wellness products.

Grand Opening: The public is invited to enjoy free samples of komchuca and meet the owners and staff at a grand opening ribbon-cutting of the Wellness Emporium with the Cannon County Chamber of Commerce Friday Nov. 9, 2018 at 10 am.

It means a lot to us to have a permanent home here in Woodbury. We want to thank Tommy and Linda Malone for this opportunity. We wouldn’t be here without the opportunity to grow our business at the Arts Center over the past three years and for them thinking outside the box with us and letting us share the space to make that possible. It feels like forever ago that we were a 6 foot table of organic vegetables at the farmers market next door!

Earlier this year we partnered with Manchester’s Scot Smotherman to expand retail with the Wellness Emporium, a second store location in the heart of Bell Buckle, TN. We truly believed if it failed we could always offer services installing taps and walk-in coolers!

With Bell Buckle doing well, growing demand quickly led to the need for bigger manufacturing space. We were running out of product and turning away a lot of wholesale requests. High Street was the right place at the right time.

High Street: Half Hill Farm is expanding our craft fermented food and beverage manufacturing in the back part of the High Street location off the square. This includes kombucha and kefir, popular probiotic fermented beverages we lightly flavor with organic herbs and juices and bottle as a fizzy soda alternative. We will also continue expanding extracts and hemp oil products to include infused food and beverage and partner with MTSU’s Fermentation Science program for shared learning and resource opportunities.

We are proud of the work our team does to bring better health and well being to our community. Come visit us!

The Wellness Emporium is open seven days a week with several flavors of Half Hill Farm’s kombucha on tap and available by the cup, bottle or growler refills. Follow us on Facebook.

The health benefits of Cordyceps Militaris mushrooms

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Our farm’s journey with the power of mushrooms started with a family illness and continues to bring healing to many friends and customers. That’s why we’re pleased to announce the addition of Cordyceps Militaris to our farm’s line of mushroom extracts!

Cordyceps are a dietary therapeutic mushroom that’s been used for centuries to improve the immune system and boost energy levels. Cordyceps were first used in the mountains of Tibet thousands of years ago as a remedy for fatigue and recovery from illness. The mushroom grows naturally on a caterpillar at elevations of 12,000 feet above sea level in China and throughout the world.

The addition of Cordyceps comes after years of listening to and observing the needs of customers who regularly use our mushroom extracts for better health and well being. Half Hill Farm also makes Red Reishi, Chaga, Turkey Tail and Lion’s Mane mushroom extracts.

Benefits of Cordyceps Mushroom extracts*:

  • Reduces inflammation & oxidative stress
  • Helps recovery from illness and exercise
  • Enhances liver & lung function
  • Improves tolerance of chemotherapy and radiation
  • Reduces tumor development
  • Improves sex drive

Studies show many benefits to using codyceps mushroom extracts including a reduction of inflammation and oxidative stress, the leading causes of most disease. This makes cordyceps, along with chaga mushrooms, a good anti-aging and recovery supplement.

Athletes use cordyceps for recovery and performance as studies show the mushroom’s adenosine levels help increase the body’s supply of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) which is a primary source of energy during physical activity. Cordyceps also increase the body’s natural production of nitric oxide optimizing oxygen absorption and improving lung and liver function.

Cordyceps militaris produces cordycepin, a bioactive compound with antitumor activity in various cancers. The mushroom’s polysaccharides help support patients in the treatment of cancers and also contains 18 essential amino acids, vitamins E, K, B1, B2 and B12, sterols and antioxidants superoxide dismutase and glutathione.

You can purchase our farm’s Cordyceps Mushroom Extract online or at our store in Woodbury and the Wellness Emporium of Bell Buckle.

Studies on potential uses of Cordyceps Militaris mushrooms:

*These statements have not been evaluated by the FDA. This product is not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease.

Farm Fails and How I Learned To Love Weeds

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The only surviving blueberry bush at Half Hill Farm

I know it’s silly, but I’ve anguished over how to write this post for about two years.

What it boils down to is a struggle between my vision for our organic farm and what life had in mind. It literally took me a couple years to believe what was really happening.

About a year into farming, a family battle with cancer focused me on the emerging science and healing power of mushrooms that grew without any effort on our farm. It’s what I could do, so I poured myself into cultivating and perfecting a quality product I needed to work for people I loved. It took a heavy toll on the farm. We stopped going to our local farmers’ market. The hops slowly faded into the hillside. Season after season, the deer were having their way in the orchard, and I started growing way more dandelions than anything I actually planted.

Failure and Success: I felt like a total failure even though something amazing was happening at the same time. Customers began calling me from all over the country because they had heard about our mushroom extracts. Our farm’s creation of a natural remedy from our first forage in our woods was changing people’s lives. I got letters and phone calls from people telling me they felt I had saved their life. I cried many times with people on the phone who called to encourage me to keep doing what I was doing. It took a lot of healing customers to convince me it was really happening, and every one was a timely miracle.

It was a life lesson and one of the most humbling experiences of my life. Here I was trying so hard to bring another pound of produce to market when the land had a much bigger purpose in mind with mushrooms and herbaceous weeds if I would just listen to life and let it be. Eager for a purposeful life, that’s exactly what I did..

Half Hill Herbals: As our extract business grew, Vince came on full time and we moved production into an FDA-registered manufacturing kitchen in Woodbury. We expanded our mushroom extracts, partnered with certified organic growers and added new herbal tinctures, extracts and tonics. As I listened and grew with our customers I could see more clearly the path we were always on and how it unfolded in our products and stories of healing. I fell more in love with our weeds, sometimes spending hours identifying and understanding them. I still have a lot to learn and a lot more to share.

      

It literally took mowing down all but one survivor of our 100 blueberry bushes last month to find the language and finally come to terms with the fact that our farm is not what I envisioned. The farm is actually something bigger and more powerful: a beautiful mess of weeds, fungi and a platform for understanding, connecting with, and sharing the healing power of nature.

There were times I sat and cried on the hillside wondering what I was doing selling cucumbers by the pound from two farmable acres. I’ve learned to listen a lot more and trust what the land has been telling me all along. With smarter stewardship and patience, the land will show you its gifts. Weeds and wild herbs that were once in the way of another small crop row have captured my imagination, my heart and my soul.

As I look five years ahead, I see a lot less struggling with mowing and keeping a tidy garden. I see more mushrooms, clover, yellow dock, elderberries, burdock, nettle, mint, yarrow, bee balm, mullein, plantain and yes, dandelion. I see sanctuary. I see more healing. I see life and sharing our future together in the weeds!

Shop Half Hill Farm online or visit our retail store in the Arts Center of Cannon County.

How hugelkultur can help heal the planet

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Hugelkultur is German for “hill culture.” It’s a composting method that allows you to grow food while longer decay processes break down large volumes of buried or mounded wood. It’s an amazing way to sequester carbon and help reduce CO2 outputs that recently have been measured at record levels along with record setting heat. It’s also something you can commit to doing right now to make a difference this Earth Day.

The problem: According to a 2010 report by the EPA, the total global emissions of carbon since the Industrial Revolution are estimated at 270 F 30 Pg (Pg = petagram = 10*15 g = 1 billion ton) due to fossil fuel combustion and 136 F 55 Pg due to changes in land use and agriculture. That’s 400 metric tons of carbon. The potential of soil organic carbon sequestration through composting is roughly 1 F 0.3 Pg C/year, or 1/3 the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 per year (which is 3.3 Pg C/year).

A backyard solution: All of that simply means composting yard wastes could reduce the annual increases in carbon output over the next 20 years by 30%. That’s not through an act of Congress or demanding corporations do anything. That’s a 30% reduction made by each of us in our own backyard. Composting yard waste simply takes all the carbon that your trees and plants sucked out of the air and puts it back in the ground (sequester) where it increases the health of soil, reduces the need for chemical fertilizers, increases water conservation and reduces CO2 emissions. When we burn yard wastes or send food wastes to landfills, we release stored carbon and converted methane into the atmosphere and become part of the problem.

How to make a hugelkultur: The process is pretty simple and a perfect way to get rid of brush, control erosion, retain water and create carbon-rich beds that will produce a lot of food. One thing we’ve added to our hugelkultur beds is old mushroom logs we hope will fruit as well.

  1. Collect carbon: this can be sticks, logs, wood chips, leaves, dried or freshly cut weeds. If you can keep a brush pile going for years, the decaying wood makes a great addition to kick-start the compost process.
  2. Dig a trench in the shape of the bed or hill you want. If you are addressing erosion, keep the trench along contours to capture or slow surface water. 2 feet is deep enough.
  3. Place a thin bed of stick in the bottom and then place your largest logs on top of that. Surround the log with more sticks and cover with wood chips and some of the dirt you dug up.
  4. Super charge your hugelkultur with mushroom logs. Myceliated mushroom logs will break down quicker while also producing edible and medicinal mushrooms. There is naturally occurring mycorrhizal fungi in healthy soil that will network itsway through your hugelkultur, but you can also introduce various fungi in a powerful way.
  5. Cover with dirt and compost if you want to immediately plant in your bed or mound. Cover with nitrogen inputs like green manure (fresh grass or weed cuttings) or animal manure if you plan to plant next season.

You will notice the bed adjust quickly after a few rains followed by a slow decay that makes the surface sink. Over time, the heavier logs will disintegrate. What’s happening is mycelium, microbes, insects and decomposition are making a rich mix of carbon and nutrients for whatever you want to plant. You can plant perennial herbs or annual fruits and vegetables for years as long as you continually amend with inputs from your property. The two beds pictured here took about 1.5 tons of carbon inputs this year alone.