Farm Tour in Photos

Well, I spent Saturday afternoon poking around several local farms.  One was a cheese dairy, one was a beef operation, and one was a sort of garden-variety grow-it-all place.  It was all very pretty and . . . farmy.

I was enamored of the ducks at a place called, creatively, Duck Run Farm.  They were not, however, as enamored of me.  I couldn’t get them to play (and don’t think I didn’t try).

Meet Spotted Pig.  I fell in love with her on Saturday.  She’s just a little piggy; she lives on the dairy farm (Chapel Hill Creamery), helping clear out densely weedy areas so they can be used for cow pasture.  She was quite the character.

This is a beef cow:

I suspect he’s a very happy beef cow.  He had friends, and a lovely field to hang out in, with lots of nice grass.  But he was less than thrilled with my presence; I found the electric fence (yeah, that’s the line across the middle of the picture; sorry about that) quite comforting.  Even so, I took my pictures, then moved on and left him to his munching.  I’m sure he’ll make someone some lovely steaks one day.

Goats are always entertaining; these two were sharing a magazine.  Sweet, no??

This is Rameses, the UNC mascot (he’s a sheep–ram, actually–for those of you not quite up to speed on your livestock varieties).  Apparently he leads quite the rock star life; personally, I thought he could stand to lose a few pounds.  Gotta love those Carolina blue horns, though–all the cool kids are wearing them.

This is a happy dairy cow, at Chapel Hill Creamery:

She lives on pasture (cleared by Spotted Pig, above) and helps make happy (ie, tasty) cheese:

Did I buy some?  Why yes, I believe I did.  I’m nibbling on a bit of Farmer’s Cheese right now–you should be jealous.

These, though, were my favorite pigs of the day:

They were rambunctious and silly, chasing each other around their pen, wallowing in the mud, and generally hamming it up for the cameras.  So freakin’ cute.

Their pen mate, a 235 pound sow, had been removed on Wednesday, and was on that night’s menu at the farm dinner.

I couldn’t go, but I bet it was delicious.  And for the record, I would’ve felt a lot better about eating that pig, having seen how it was raised, than I would some random bacon from the grocery store–or at the drive-thru.

Watch out.  I’m on a rampage.