Lone Tree
Cattle Company

About Us

In the early 2000’s Stan Pace while working as an Extension Agent for Mississippi State University began looking more and more at sustainable agriculture and how to reduce the use of chemicals in farming practices.  “When I really started to look at the situation it was obvious that many of the insect, weed and disease problems that we face with agriculture commodities are magnified and multiplied by us an our flagrant use of chemicals.”  “The light bulb really came on when I read that weeds are not the problem, they are merely symptoms of the problem, and that each weed will tell us things about soil fertility if we will only listen”.  The change in Stan’s thinking took some time as for 20 plus years he had been taught by the modern system.  In 2007 after selling their home in Mississippi the Pace family moved to Paint Lick, Kentucky and purchased a 165 acre cow / calf operation and began the conversion to a grass finishing operation. Lone Tree Cattle Company is the farm that came about and is currently one of the two primary finishers for Better Beef LLC. 

The other primary finisher for Better Beef LLC is Kidd Farms owned and operated by Earnie Kidd and his family.  After conventionally farming with dairy, burley tobacco, and beef cattle for many years his thinking changed on how to produce higher quality beef with higher quality forages.  “Through the use of Management Intensive Grazing (MIG), and other best management sustainable agriculture practices I am beginning to see a difference in the quality of my cattle, my forges and my land.  I grew up on a small dairy / tobacco / beef / corn family farm.  We grew our own meat and garden vegetables and it was a good way of life.  Somehow over the years I got away from that.  I still farmed but got drawn into the norm of purchasing most of what we ate because it was easy and fast and just what everyone else was doing.  Sometime in the last couple of years everything began screaming at me “there is a better way.”  The realization and the remembrance that years ago we grew higher quality foods, local foods that kept us healthier than the highly processed foods people are buying today.  Providing the best for me and my family, my friends and my neighbors, that’s why I made the switch back to an old way of doing things with my farming.”

Better Beef was born when Stan & Earnie had the idea to share their home grown antibiotic and hormone free beef with their friends and neighbors.  It just didn’t make sense to waste the fuel and energy to truck cattle 1000’s of miles, grow grains and feed cattle in confinement, when great tasting, healthier beef could be grown within a short distance to the people who need it.  When you’re proud of what you have it’s easy to talk about it and share it with others.  We finish beef on grass, in the same fields where the grass grows.  Earnie’s dad used to say “we eat what we produce; if it’s not good enough for us it’s not good enough for anyone else”.  We do eat our own beef and we are proud to offer it to you.  Better Beef is Kentucky beef, processed in Kentucky, grown especially for people who care about what they eat and where it comes from.  If you are ever in Paint Lick, Kentucky, stop by the Farm on Frog Branch and we’ll be glad to show you how your beef was grown.