I had a baby calf named “Pest” nuzzle my leg in a milk barn in Lockport today. I’m a city girl for sure but there’s something about the soft, trusting innocence of baby farm animals that just touches my heart. I spent the day today at a couple of dairy farms for a story I’m doing on organic farming and humane animal husbandry in the Niagara region. It’s kind of a revelation to learn that there are only a few organic farms in the area. The Haseley Farm in Lockport turned organic almost by accident. They couldn’t afford herbicide one year so they turned the fields instead, which worked just as well. Their vet urged them to consider organic farming because they were already halfway there. The good news for farmers is that organic dairy farming doubles what they can get for their product. That encourages farmers to produce milk that is chemical and hormone free and gives us better access to the choice of buying organic. The Haisley Farm sells to Wegmans. Another farm I visited in Medina was owned by an Amish farmer, Ed Yoder who, surprisingly, is the only Amish farmer in his community to go organic. Except for his son, who also runs an organic farm down the road.

I went to see the Yoeder farm because he was listed on the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York website as a “humane” farmer, which I thought meant that he practiced humane killing as well, but actually means he practices humane animal husbandry. As he told me, “killing is killing,” and he has to send his cows to the same miserable slaughter houses the other cows are sent to because those are FDA approved. I’m still looking for more organic farmers. Apparently, due to FDA regs you can’t kill a cow humanely. You have to send it to a slaughterhouse where, even if you don’t care that they are brutalized and scared, their adrenalin pumps through their system and must surely make its way into the meat. Can’t be good for us. But at least the cows I saw today are well treated while they are alive. It’s all part of organic farming, which I’m looking forward to learning more about. In fact I’m still looking for a farmer who is engaged in community supported agriculture, where people sign up in advance to receive regular distributions of pure, beautiful, toxic free fruits and vegetables.