Jared Phillips and Lindi Phillips are proud Ozarkers, farming on land above the Muddy Fork of the Illinois River in Northwest Arkansas. They sell lamb directly to customers, as well as selling breeding stock to other farmers.

“Like a lot of folks in Arkansas, we both have off-farm jobs,” Jared said. He’s a history professor at the University of Arkansas, and Lindi is a certified sheep shearer. Her business, Heft Shearing Company, operates throughout northern and central Arkansas, southern Missouri, and eastern Oklahoma.

Both their families have been rural, working class farmers in the Ozarks for generations. “Our parents were the generation that came off the family farm,” said Phillips. “And then we got back into farming.”

The Phillips are throwbacks in another way. They use draft horses. “If you’re not afraid of them, if you’re trained, they’re incredibly economical,” said Phillips. “You can get a good pair of horses and equipment for less than a reliable tractor. They produce their own feed. They replace themselves if you breed them.”

Real horsepower makes sense on small acreages, especially in the mountains and hollers of northwest Arkansas. “Where I live, we have real fragile soil,” said Phillips. “Horses don’t compact the soil as much as tractors, and they can maneuver in tight spaces where a tractor might flip.”

“We enjoy working with the horses, but it wouldn’t be feasible for us if it didn’t pay off on our bottom line,” he continued.

Environmental Quality Incentives Program (EQIP) funding helped the Phillips family establish rotational grazing for the approximately 130 breeding ewes and lambs at Branch Mountain Farm. The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), passed by the 117th Congress and signed by President Biden in 2022, included an $8.45 billion EQIP funding authorization.

The Phillips family also used funding from the nonprofit Indiana River Watershed Project. The supplemental funding provided by these programs created a bit more room in the family’s budget to upgrade the farm. 

With EQIP, Jared and Lindi made additional permanent fencing and water access. “Water access for us was the big thing,” said Jared Phillips. “It allowed us to open up different pastures that we hadn’t been able to get into with livestock.”

The Phillipses put up smaller temporary paddocks within their multi-acre pastures, moving sheep frequently to facilitate intensive grazing. This method of grazing improved pasture health, with the sheep manure stimulating grass regrowth. The EQIP grant helped pay for trenching, a well, water lines, and waterers in these pastures. 

“We still would have expanded our farm, but without these programs, it would have happened at a much slower pace,” Jared said. “It would take more time with less finances and the limited time we have to invest.” Ultimately, the funding helped them expand their operation, save on operational costs long-term and improve Branch Mountain’s bottom line. 

“As we were able to manage the ground better, we were able to turn the resources that we would have had to expend on water systems into increasing our stocking rate, so that then led us to increase our revenue,” Phillips said. 

The fertilizer from rotational grazing allowed them to quit buying synthetic fertilizer for their hayfields. “We haven’t used synthetic fertilizer on those fields now for several years because the grazing had such a positive impact,” Phillips said. 

Philips would like to see more robust funding for the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), which provides technical assistance for EQIP and other programs. This support would allow more farmers to benefit from programs that have helped Branch Mountain Farm’s bottom line.

Though he can see the benefits of these programs on their farm now, Jared thinks it might be their children that reap the full value of their efforts. Jared and Lindi have three kids, ages 12, 7 and 4.

“A lot of what we do, we know we won’t see the full payout for,” Jared said. “You know, farming’s a long game. We know that some of the systems we put in place, it may be their generation that sees the fruition of that goal.”

The Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), passed by the 117th Congress and signed by President Biden, is a piece of federal legislation that aims to reduce inflation by lowering the cost of prescription medications, investing in domestic energy production, and promoting clean energy, among other objectives.