Meet the Phillips Family
Maddy traded her life as a professional pilot for ranch life in order to raise her family in a way of life in which we believe we were intended. A milk cow, chickens, and gardening were not originally on the agenda, but were steadily learned through countless hours of study, trial and error, and perseverance. She overcame her fear of horses by training her first colt, Aspen, all by herself. She has since discovered her love of growing food with which to nurture our young family, beliefs firmly rooted in the concept of farm to table, health starting in the gut and a life lived outside.
Maddy
After a career in the United States Marine Corps elite Special Operations Command, the Ranching way of life brought James new purpose and a refreshing everyday perspective.
Since his transition from the military he has refined his own methods of horse training through natural horsemanship methods developed through the study of wild horses and a wide array of natural horsemanship trainers. These methods are based on a mutual understanding between horse and human to create a highly functional team, regardless of the discipline or job, to successfully accomplish goals and tasks together. This process has been refined through working with and training many horses of different breeds, ages, and backgrounds over the years. James firmly believes there is no "cookie cutter" approach to working with animals, every animal should be treated as an individual in order to bring out their full potential. James has also trained his own working stock dogs, which he uses daily at Porter Ranch and has competed with them at a National level in field trial competitions. He continues to refine his skills day working at large ranching operations across the Mid-West United States, competing in stockdog competitions and simultaneously building out our own future generational program, Porter Ranch.
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James
Porter
Farm Mascot and MVP
James received his service dog, Porter, from a nonprofit - Labs for Liberty - in 2017. L4L gifts a small number of service dogs each year to Special Operations veterans. James had no idea how much he would need him, but more so how much Porter would change his world. Porter has been there through some of the hardest times of James' life as he transitioned out of the military.
"Porter was in the delivery room for the birth of our daughter, Margo. He helped us find this place we call home, with his obsessive need to fetch sticks and be outside partly to blame."
These days, you can find Porter taking life a little less seriously- napping in the grass, sneaking table scraps from the kids, and barking at magpies. It’s only right then, that the place he lead us to, should be named after him.
Our hopes are that Porter Ranch, as it continues to build, may outlive us all and generations from now can learn about a yellow Lab named Porter, who changed a man's life for the better.