Farming

Wow! That's about all I can say about this fantastic idea that I just saw on a friend's facebook. Check out this video!

As I wrote about the other day, the boys and I dropped out to Saffire Farms on Friday to learn how to tap maple trees. Of course, since there is never any rest on a farm and always another job that needs to be done, we got more than we'd bargained for and learned quite a bit about the care and feeding of the cattle. When we arrived we knocked at the farmhouse door to be greeted by Janet, who told us that Gord and their son Brad were over at the barn dealing with the cattle. Being familiar with the lay of the land on the farm, I headed off that way with the boys, to find Gord rounding up some calves into the pen, to tag their ears. This is how each animal is identified and tracked. You'll notice my comments in the video that the jittery calves must mean that the tagging hurts them, but Gord explains it is more a matter that this was the first time these calves were getting this close to humans, and this was a far bigger issue for them.

In the video you get a glimpse at the vast pastures on Saffire Farms, which is impressive given there are only a dozen or so animals which get to share them. The video is shot mostly in the pens where the tagging takes place. We get to see how pens are used to segregate animals for various reasons. In one case there is a pen for calves that are being weaned. In another case, there is a pen for the 2 grain fed cattle - Gord rounds them up into the pen long enough to feed them their daily dose of beet pulp, soy, and barley. This is the first year they are doing grain fed beef at Saffire - something Gord agreed to try at the request of some of his customers. The majority of the cattle are still 100% grass fed, but by making use of the pens he is able to do some grain fed beef as well, yet still allow all the animals relatively free roam of the land.

A couple of years ago I started using the the term "My Farmer" when talking about the person who grows my food for me. At first, it seemed even to me to be rather contrived. It just did not seem to roll off the tongue at all. And to others I'm sure it may have even seemed pretentious. But really, these attitudes towards those words only demonstrate how far removed we have become from our food. And in my opinion, this is an extremely unhealthy situation for our society.

You do not have to think long to find other examples of where this phraseology is used - we do it all the time. We all talk about "my doctor", "my dentist", and even often you hear "my lawyer". And nobody thinks anything of it. "my mechanic" and "my plumber" are also extremely common terms that many of us use quite regularly. We use these words because it shows that we've developed a special trust relationship with those people when performing those services for us. It shows that we do not want some anonymous person doing those things for us - we want someone that we've developed a trust relationship with. When it comes to a medical issue you are experiencing, do you shop around looking for who is having the best rates this week? Is that what you do when having your car fixed? Maybe some of us do, but most of us would sooner pay a bit more - but still a fair price - to have our car fixed by someone we trust.