NoNAIS.org

How does the post below from my farm blog relate to NAIS and protecting our traditional rights to farm? Well… the more our urban cousins understand and relate to their food and to our rural lives the more likely they are to help protect us from the encroachment of Big Brother government and it’s henchmen in the corporate world. Every little bit helps. Remember, urban dwellers now outnumber us country folk worldwide. Educate them to the joys of the country. What they appreciate they will want to protect.

Jill of Blackie with Newborn Piglets
The other day Sugar Mountain Farm was mentioned briefly in an article on the front page of the New York Times about localvores. We don’t get the paper so we only found out about it when Holly’s father called to say he had seen us on the front page of the NY Times.

“The highest form of luxury is now growing it yourself or paying other people to grow it for you,” said Corby Kummer, the food columnist and book author. “This has become fashion.”

Locally grown food, even fully cooked meals, can be delivered to your door. A share in a cow raised in a nearby field can be brought to you, ready for the freezer — a phenomenon dubbed cow pooling. There is pork pooling as well. At Sugar Mountain Farm in Vermont, the demand for a half or whole rare-breed pig is so great that people will not be seeing pork until the late fall.

Although a completely local diet is out of reach for even the most dedicated, the shift toward it is being driven by the increasingly popular view that fast food is the enemy and that local food tastes better. Depending on the season, local produce can cost an additional $1 a pound or more. But long-distance food, with its attendant petroleum consumption and cheap wages, is harming the planet and does nothing to help build communities, locavores believe.
-NY Times

That lead to a Massachusetts based NECNTV news crew coming out to our farm this morning. If you have high speed internet you can go to their web site to see the short video segment. Here’s the short bit of text from the video page:

(NECN: Anya Huneke, West Topsham, Vermont) - It is another lazy day at Sugar Mountain Farm in West Topsham, Vermont — for the animals, that is. Walter and Holly Jeffries are hard at work, trying to keep up with demand for their product.

The Jeffries used to be sheep farmers, but after a lot of time and effort, and limited reward, they ventured into pig farming.

Sugar Mountain Farm currently sells piglets and pastured pork to local residents, stores and restaurants. One of the benefits of pigs is their rapid growth rate. When they are born, they only weigh three pounds, but they gain one to one-and-a-half pounds a day. [Slight correction, “up to 2.4 lbs/day” -WJ]

And, as far as the animals go, Walter says pigs are pretty low maintenance. This has enticed more Vermonters into the business of pig farming. The “eat local” movement has played a part as well.

Despite the rising demand for their all-natural, free-range pigs, the Jeffries are intent on remaining a local business.
-NECN TV News

The NY Times article generated a lot of heated debate in their comments about whether it is valid to have someone else come to plant and weed your garden. Interesting question. Ideally people would get the exercise and enjoyment from gardening but not everybody likes it or has the inclinations. I came to the conclusion that it is just as valid as having someone else raise a pig for you, which we do for many people, someone else repairing your car (Thank you, Monty), someone else doing your dentistry (Thank you, Dr. V. & staff), someone else being your doctor (Thank you, Dr. J.), someone else delivering your mail (Thank you Beth, Don and Annie), etc. Like Mr. Long, I enjoy doing a wide variety of things, but there’s no rule that we all must do everything. Each to their own temperament.

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects!

-Lazarus Long (of Robert Heinlein)

NY Times article also implies that local food costs more. Yes, sometimes that is true, but only if you’re contrasting it to commodity grown, pesticide coated, herbicide laden, antibiotic filled, conventional mass-produced ‘food’ one typically sees at the supermarket. If you compare apples to apples, that is to say local organic apples to long distance organic apples then the costs are comparable and the local apples may even be less expensive while still having higher quality. Local food, at least in these parts, is generally organically produced, be it with USDA approved big ‘O’ or real-world little ‘o’. The result is local food is generally not just better quality, better for you, better for the environment, better for your area economy but also a little less pricey since it hasn’t had to travel as far. This leaves the real question of organic vs non-organic which is a completely separate debate…

Outdoors: 70°F/56°F Mostly Sunny
Farm House: 72°F/68°F
Tiny Cottage: 66°F/62°F