Stamp of approval

Sometimes you're the writer, sometimes you're the subject. Well, actually, about ninety nine percent of the time I'm the writer (that's kinda of the deal with being an environmental journalist). So it's kind of weird/cool to be written about, especially by the subject of your work. 

Seriously, though, I'm sure Derek at Our Family Farm wouldn't have blogged about my recent visit if I had come alone. Derek probably didn't expect an intelligent, inquisitive pre-teen to come stocked with questions about his animal husbandry practices and ethical outlook. But he certainly was ready for it. As a parent, I appreciated the serious way he addressed Lily's queries instead of adopting a condescending tone or simply brushing her off. He must have been a good teacher. I'm glad he decided to become a chicken farmer. We bought a CSA share after that visit and roasted the first bird last week after letting it soak it overnight in kalamata olive brine. Delicious! Add my stamp of approval to Lily's.

I'm also glad I took Lily, both from an ethical eating and a parenting standpoint. Two years ago we stumbled into backyard chicken raising, thanks to a stray black pullet that wandered into my neighbors yard one night – scared the bejesus out of her by flying up onto her shoulder when she let her dog out. We took the pullet, which quickly grew into a magnificent Black Austrolorp hen in need of company. Two years later and we have a flock of four laying hens, a sharp-looking cedar coop, thanks to yours truly, and a daughter with a much more developed dietary ethic.

Lily with Sakura (Japanese for Cherry Blossom) during our first year raising hens.

By taking a hand in caring for the birds, Lily has come to understand farm animals as more than just a source of food. She sees them as unique individuals that deserve to be treated with care and respect, especially considering that some give up their lives to nourish us. She’s also learned about the horrid conditions of commercial chicken factories. And they are factories; you just can’t stretch the term farm that far.

So this year Lily came to a clear decision: she would only eat wild meat. Next followed family conversations about the long and complex relationship between humans and farm animals (I firmly believe that farm animals, until the dawn of industrial agriculture, have made a good evolutionary bet by teaming up with people, but more on that in another post). Lily decided that she would eat meat from local farms if she could visit them in person to confirm that the animals were raised well. That fit with our family’s effort to eat as sustainably and as close to home as possible, so we started looking for a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm that sold poultry. Our Family Farm fit the bill.

The timing couldn’t have been better, seeing as I was reporting a story on local CSAs for the Natural Choice Directory. I decided to take Lily on a reporting trip to the farm so she could give it the once over and I could interview Derek about his experience as a new farmer. As a bonus, I learned that Our Family Farm had teamed up with two other small Willamette Valley poultry operations to build a mobile processing unit (MPU). Mobile slaughter houses are a big deal, in terms of ensuring that small farmers can process their product in a humane and cost effective manner. If the way commercial chickens are raised doesn’t turn your stomach, the working conditions at massive chicken processing plants should do the trick.

And it looks like things may get worse. So, from a workers rights as well as an animal ethics standpoint, I’m happy that our family is using its consumer power to support a local MPU. The first in Oregon no less. Even better, the Eugene Weekly agreed with me that it was a newsworthy item, so next month I’ll be writing a cover story about Our Family Farm and the new MPU.