Jessica's fifteenth birthday was in the middle of March, but to surprise her, Mommy signed us up for a tour of a "Lunatic Tour" at Polyface Farm, the first of which was last Thursday. All Jessica knew was that we were going somewhere for her birthday surprise. So we hopped in the car (well, not quite that simple... hopped in with three bags of extra clothing/coats/shoes, and lots to do on the drive) and drove 3 hours south through lots of beautiful farm land to Polyface Farm, which is, according to them, "a family owned, multi-generational, pasture-based, beyond organic, local-market farm." We have heard Joel Salatin (the farmer) speak at the HEAV convention a few times and in the movies Food, Inc. and Fresh and really like everything he has to say. Their philosophy is to make use of the Creator's design for each animal - respecting the "pigness of the pig" and the "chickenness of the chicken." There's a lot more, to it, but that's the underlying principle. Jessica was very happily surprised.
We got there an hour early (!) so we took our time checking out the rabbits and chickens nearby.
The babies were so cute! they brought back good memories of our baby bunnies!
Jeannine is definitely the biggest animal lover of the family.
THEN... someone ran up calling, "Groves, Groves!" Our friends the Toms from NC had driven 4 hours up for the tour that same day and neither family knew the other family was coming! God surprised us all!
Toms and Grove kids (missing Julia)
We all hopped on the hay ride and headed out to see the farm!
First stop: the Eggmobile.
Joel's son Daniel, who does most of the farming while Joel speaks, led the tour.
Stop #2: We even got a lesson on dirt, grass, and worms - an important aspect of Polyface.
Stop #3: Pastured Poultry
this was the first day for the birds out of the brooder
Stop #4: The Pigaerators
They layer cow manure, wood chips, and corn, then let the pigs come in and aerate it all into nice compost - with corn as their reward!
Groves and Toms with Daniel Salatin
We came home with some pastured poultry and just this morning enjoyed a delicious breakfast of farm-fresh eggs and pigaerator sausage. mmmmm.....
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