In an era where “efficiency” is the buzzword in the poultry industry, it takes a radical person to admit increased production doesn’t necessarily lead to better production. Sonora, Calif.-based turkey producer and processor Diestel Family Ranch has held tight to this perspective since its founding in 1949, for so much of that time competing with bigger, louder voices saying otherwise. In recent years, however, the conversation has begun to shift as consumers are starting to equate certain sustainable practices with value.
For Diestel Family Ranch, this shift has been patiently awaited.
“We’ve been producing natural and organic products throughout the entirety of our company’s history,” said Heidi Orrock (Diestel), fourth-generation family farmer of Diestel Family Ranch. “It’s kind of just like the base of what we did and how we did it.”
Movement Makers
Seventy-five years ago, Jack Diestel began the family ranch with the philosophy that if you do right by the earth and by the birds, they will do right by you. This mindset was passed on through the generations. So, when the push for organic farming certifications erupted in the ‘90s, it was natural for Diestel Family Ranch to be a part of it.
The Diestel family helped set the standards for organic poultry. They sold some of the first products to be labeled as USDA certified organic poultry in 1999.
“When my parents were farming, and they were doing no antibiotics, vegetarian fed, it was very natural for us to not want to utilize chemicals or to not utilize synthetic herbicides or pesticides on our farms or in our ranches,” Orrock said.
Orrock sees this moment in Diestel Family Ranch’s history as an example of the company’s commitment to be a pioneer in the sustainable agriculture space. She recognizes that going organic was “phenomenal,” but she’s always asking, “How do we do more?”
Orrock believes regenerative agriculture is another step toward the family company’s continued mission for improvement.
“We’re not the largest in the country, and we never will be the largest producer in the country,” she said. “That’s not necessarily our goal to be the biggest. But it is our goal to be the best, and it is our goal to grow and scale and continue to produce food with a mission.”
Regenified
This past summer, Diestel Family Ranch took a significant step toward its goal by becoming the first turkey producer to achieve Regenified certification. Orrock explained that Regenified’s seal is the first third-party regenerative program to be recognized and accepted by the US Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) for single and multi-ingredient products.
To achieve certification, Diestel Family Ranch met Regenified’s 6-3-4 Standards — named for six principles of soil health, three rules of adaptive stewardship and four ecosystem processes.
“Regenified certification is an important recognition of what has always differentiated Diestel turkeys from mass-produced poultry products,” Orrock said. “We lead with the strictest animal welfare and environmental standards in the market to produce the leanest, cleanest and most delicious birds.”
Regenified’s certification process will help Diestel Family Ranch track its progress in advancing regenerative principles to improve biodiversity, soil health, water quality and nutrient density.
Soil regeneration at Diestel Family Ranch starts by feed the turkeys corn. (Source: Diestel Family Ranch)Soil centered
This endeavor was first instigated after Jason Diestel, fellow fourth-generation farmer at Diestel Family Ranch and brother to Orrock, began researching waste diversion of organic materials. He sought out ways to better allocate Diestel Family Ranch’s organic waste like bird feathers or pine wood shavings from the barn. Through connections he made with professionals in the soil health sphere, Diestel learned how to make a high-quality humus compost out of organic waste.
Diestel Family Ranch has since started producing nutrient-dense compost, which it sells and gives to its surrounding community. Currently, the farm diverts 2,117 tonnes of waste annually from landfills and produces roughly 6,350 tonnes of compost for local use.
In seeking to improve soil structure and health, Diestel Family Ranch picked up different practices that align with regeneration today even before the regenerative movement came into play.
“We were growing this very natural conversation around, ‘Well, wait a second, soil health doesn’t have to be a compost that you reapply. This could be something that we are regenerating over the course and the life of our impact,’” Orrock said.
Diestel Family Ranch started implementing this theory through a pasture raised program based on its home ranch nearly a decade ago, which was successful but not without challenges. The company struggled to know how to scale the program, how to keep the pastures green and how to rotate the birds.
The Diestel family began talking with experts in the regenerative space, which proved to be the missing piece in their puzzle.
“The thing about the Regenified team that we were so thankful for is a lot of the folks within that group are actual farmers,” Orrock said. “And so, when we started to talk to them about what it meant to be regenified, it felt like we had landed on the moon in a sense because there was so much collaboration. When you’re in farming, you would think it’d be highly collaborative, but it isn’t always. Sometimes you’re really out on your own trying to figure things out.”
Through this partnership with Regenified, Diestel Family Ranch was able to find a way to scale its pasture raised program.
“It feels like such a long time coming, and such a reward to be the first turkey producer in the country, but also just to be continuing to have those conversations and really pushing for better and for more,” Orrock said.
Regenerating the soil at Diestel Family Ranch starts by feeding the birds corn, grown by local farmers. Earlier this spring, the company sourced 650 tonnes of Certified Regenified corn for its feed. By 2035, the farm looks to replace half of its feed with Certified Regenified corn.
Other company initiatives include mimicking the birds’ natural habitat. Diestel Family Ranch has set out to create a shaded environment that replicates trees in a forest. All birds on the property are given access to open land that includes over two miles of evergreen, perennial shrubs, grasses and flowering trees. The plants were specifically selected to promote biodiversity — attract beneficial insects, improve water quality and create a diverse, functional landscape.
As for the birds’ health, Diestel Family Ranch uses probiotics over traditional chemicals to support a healthy ecosystem.
Diestel Family Ranch produces approximately 350,000 turkey around Thanksgiving time. (Source: Diestel Family Ranch)Thanksgiving roundup
Diestel Family Ranch produces approximately 350,000 turkeys, specifically around Thanksgiving time. Because the company works so hard on the front end of production, all the way to how the turkeys are raised on the farm, Diestel Family Ranch tries to keep processing to a minimum so that the poultry itself can shine.
“Our processing — whether it be primary processing or further processing — we really try to have a quality approach with minimal additives and as minimal processing as possible to enjoy the nutrient density the turkey should have,” Orrock said.
Through this approach, Diestel Family Ranch looks to achieve higher protein and lower sodium by using quality ingredients and having a very stringent list of items they refuse to use.
The company’s primary processing is mainly done by hand in a large butcher-style setup. Leaning into old-school tactics, Diestel Family Ranch incorporates an ice chilling method for a clean, effective way to chill the birds down quickly without a large amount of water uptake.
“Most of the time our water uptake is around a percent and a half,” Orrock noted. “But we label 3%, which most producers can label up to 6% in poultry. So we have very minimal water uptake on our whole turkeys, and we use the least amount of chemicals as possible, but still testing for the USDA with the bacteria load where we need it to be.”
As the family operation gears up for its busy season, it also has innovation on its mind. Most popular around the holidays is the traditional whole turkey, but to keep the momentum alive all year round, the company is looking into launching a couple new products to cater to consumers’ everyday use of meats. First in the works is a regenerative ground turkey product. To follow that, Diestel Family Ranch is planning on introducing regenerative deli meat.
