One big rolling hill feeds woolly-but shedding- goats, cows, and pigs all at once. Chickens run about picking at dung and laying eggs in a house under the shadow of a giant oak. The breeds of all the animals are old (less domesticated) enough so that the cows (females) still have horns and the wild boar and cattle still wear a full coat, which protects them from weather hot and cold. A stream seeps through the little valley of the hills, through the drying late spring grass, making the ground muddy enough for wallowing boar. It is an amazingly efficient system: sun/water to grass to animal to meat, milk, and eggs.
This small farm teems with life, and though death is a part of why they are all here, the focus is on the needs of the moment. Ted doesn’t like to discuss too much about slaughter for a couple of reasons: He raises his animals to give them a good life, to connect with them, and to give people a source of healthy and sustainable food. The death is always hard- there is no easy way around it, and it is also the smallest part. As we walk up the steep slope, Ted mumbles something about people needing to eat less meat. There, in the animals’ space this is a clear conclusion. If we are going to eat animals, they should live like this- If they are going to be able to live like this, there will have to be a lot less of them (but, a lot more farmers!). Ted could have more animals but too large a scale compromises his relationship with them.
It is clear that Ted wrestles every day with the difficulty of his task of raising friends for others’ food. He seems to reconcile this with the fact (Ted and I share the view that this fact is not really arguable) that humans are omnivores and if he doesn’t raise animals for food in this way, more animals will be raised in ways deprive them of a good life, one in which they can live out their days using their full instinct and potential.
I didn’t have a chance to really get into a full conversation with Ted about these ideas on this visit, so I don’t want to go further and risk putting words in his mouth. But I know he has a lot more to say and I hope to visit again and share more. Ted is the farmer from whom I buy meat the most often (what little I buy) and I often see him weekly. He is a very thoughtful man and I appreciate how much love he gives to my meals.
It is an emotional thing, seeing the animals you will eat. So forgive me if this post is a little heavier. But I think its important to acknowledge that eating meat isn’t a simple act, nor should it ever really be easy. It isn’t the act of eating per se but the ease we have created that has really made meat consumption a problem. An easy thing in terms of production and an easy thing in terms of what little we experience, and how far we are from the creature living out a life. (That life demands some death is a fact that makes this idea of test-tube meat all the more disturbing and so reductionist, as if we could be nourished on something that didn’t eat, that didn’t live at all)
As with many dilemmas about food, I again come to the conclusion that it is really important to spend more money on food, especially on those products from animals. When weighing price options, consider what corners were cut to provide whatever you might be saving. It isn’t an easy choice, but I think 1) it is important to be honest that for most of us, spending on food is about choices, and 2) that it is only fair for us to make some sacrifices in return. Ted’s meat is just about the most expensive I could get. Ground beef is $7/lb. So I can’t buy very much, and I think Ted agrees that’s probably for the best.
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