I am now half way through my time away working at this Jewish environmentalist farm in Connecticut. As I swam in the lake following our weekly pre-Shabbt mikveh dunk, I realised that I had done something new on every day of this week. The fun farm work that springs to mind is working an a sweltering shed roof hanging 3428 sticks of recently harvested garlic to dry out, tasting the first of the farm's tomatoes whilst trellising the plants and turning the latest blueberry harvest into jam. I was excited to discover an unknown talent this week: holding a goat's mouth open and pushing a large pill deep into her throat with a stick.
To give you more of an idea about what I'm learning here I'll go on to explain a few aspects of life here. Firstly about the organic farming I'm learning about here, secondly about the lifecycle of goats and dairy farming and finally the experience of living and working in this unusual setting.
The buzz word to describe the kind of farming done here is permaculture, where an agricultural system is designed to mimic the relationships found in natural ecology. A sign of a successful application of permaculture is where each part of the system is able to have multiple functions. A great example of this is the chickens that we keep. They provide us with two dozen eggs a day. They also eat and in the process airate the compost, allowing it to decompose faster. There was one rooster living with them, primarily to scare off predators, apparently without success: fifteen hens, the rooster himself and countless eggs have disappeared over the last month. None have disappeared in the last week, since we spent a day hacking at all the weeds around the coop, removing the cover for the elusive predator.
We have four other roosters on site, who are being used for a very different purpose – as a rooster tractor. They live in a wooden frame, large enough for them to move around happily and small enough for us to move it regularly. It is relocated every two days to a different area of the orchard for them to weed. The other purpose they will serve is when they are literally served, as dinner, next week. As a permaculture system two uses is not enough when there could be even more. The death of the roosters will be used as a timely educational resource; we will learn about shechitah from an alumnus of the programme who is now working as a schochet, before we witness the slaughter and no doubt all alter our career path, rushing to find out how to become slaughterers.
The choice of crops on each bed is in a carefully crafted rotation system with, for example, a crop of peas fixing the nitrogen needed for next year's cabbage. Similarly winter cover crops of rye and barley are used to stop soil erosion when the fields flood in the winter. In the spring they are then ploughed in to the soil, decomposing within the soil and further enriching it. Surrounding the fields and at the end of some of the beds are crops of unharvested flowering plants which are there to attract more pollinators to the area. They are joined by the bees in the hive at the centre of the farm who ensure the timely pollination of the courgette, cucumber and aubergine flowers and provide us with honey.
We've been learning about the rationale behind all of these methods during some of our evening classes on permaculture design. While we are weeding, hoeing or harvesting in the fields or seeding in the greenhouse the farm manager and apprentices always explain why they made the choices they have. The goats, unable as they are to make their own decisions, have certainly taught us all about the potential impact of ours.
For a long time I have pointed out that the choice to be a vegetarian for ethical reasons is not entirely consistent because the production of milk and eggs is so tied in to the production of meat. The process of weaning the kids from their mothers showed this clearly.
The goats are a valuable part of the agricultural system here at Adamah: they provide a good quality fertiliser in the manure and the possibility of creating and selling the value added products made from their milk including feta, chevre and goatgurd (yogurt). In order to produce milk they must have kids annually. Once a year a 'buck' is hired from a neighbouring farm and spends a day servicing the female goats. The does then give birth in the spring; they produce milk, nurse their young and begin providing the dairy with a steady source of milk. By the end of June the kids no longer require their mothers' nutrition. They are ready to be weaned.
We all took the weaning process very seriously, aware that this was a big day for the goats and inevitably projecting human emotions of forced familial separation onto the animals. All the male goats were removed and weighed one by one and placed into the back of the truck. At first it was easy for Aitan, the goatkeeper, to catch them. By the last two they seemed to know what was going on, requiring two people and a rugby tackle to catch the kids. One got away and rushed to his mother for a last goodbye. Once they were all in the truck we all cycled on ahead ready to great them on the other side of the farm in the newly set aside “boystown”. There the kids were unloaded, welcomed ceremoniously by us and ran off together, gracefully, beautifully to explore their new green pasture. The male goats will stay there and grow. In the autumn they will be sold and then slaughtered for meat. The next day the dairy's milk production more than doubled. The cheese and goatgurd making process really began. For a dairy to be economically viable the male goats must be killed each year.
The next day my fellow British Adamahnik, Poppy, was working in boystown. She counted the goats: there were only 5 of the 13 were there. She quickly cycled back to site and alerted the staff. The goat search began. They were eventually found back beside the swimming pool on the way to find their mothers. Through scent, the sun or just a remarkable sense of direction, they had escaped under the fence, reached the road, walked down Beebe Hill, crossed Johnson Road, entered the retreat centre passed the “Slow down” sign and had found themselves on the lawn. All available hands were called in and everyone rushed to grab and pick up a goat and secure them beside the swimming pool, the nearest enclosed area. One kid managed to escape this and managed to make it all the way back to the barnyard and their mothers. With the reluctance to leave and the desperation to go back to their mothers, it was impossible not to project painful human emotions on to these animals.
For many in the group this was difficult: we were forcing these animals to go against their instinct. Yet most people thought that it was reassuring to be a part of this process at a small-scale farm. We can see that the goats are being treated respectfully and given plenty of green pasture; this would certainly not be the case at industrial farms.
The does will be milked until January and then left for the process to begin again in the spring. Witnessing the weaning process was a great opportunity to think more about what it means to domesticate and breed animals for our purposes and to see the economic necessity of the link between dairy and meat farming.
Living here and being an Adamah fellow keeps us busy every minute of the day. Though few of us thought we would get used to it, the start of the day at 6am with morning prayer/meditation is really valued. It wakes us up whilst providing a positive communal start to the day and a chance to build meditation into daily routine. After a break for breakfast and chores, such as milking and opening the chicken coop, we work in the fields, dairy or pickling centre until midday. A two hour break for lunch is followed by another work session. After dinner we have our classes on a Jewish, food and/or agricultural theme.
The packed schedule during the week, with so little spare time has helped make the shabbatot here so wonderful. Beginning with a mikvah dunk in the stream behind the field and followed by a harvesting of whichever vegetables we decide to cook that evening, shabbat here has been full of great singing, food and time spent without work in our wonderful group.
We have also been lucky enough to have been taught by some well known teachers and authors. Meeting and listening to Rabbi Everett Gendler and his wife Mary, a 1960s civil rights activist, who is credited with having introduced Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel and Martin Luther King, was a real honour. We also had a session with a group of Christians, Muslims and Jews who were working on an inter-faith farming and activist training project in upstate New York. One of their organisers is Rabbi Lynn Gottleib, one of the first female rabbis who has been working on giving non-violent action a more thorough Jewish dimension with the notion of being 'shomer shalom', a keeper of peace. At another seminar we were taught by Rabbi Arthur Waskow, an outspoken social activist leader who broke down in tears as he talked to us about the oil spill in the gulf. It was exciting for me to meet people whose books and articles I have read.
Just by living in this setting we are getting exposure to interesting and cutting edge Jewish practice and thinking. The Isabella Freedman Retreat Centre has a constant flow of guests, events and teachers. It was a really interesting experience to participate in the Tisha B'Av services here with visiting Rabbis Nadia and Victor Gross. Throughout August there are Jewish spirituality retreats and hopefully, if there is any time off from farming, opportunities for learning.
The work of Adamah as a leadership training programme is funded by Hazon, the Jewish food charity. Motivated by Jewish environmentalist values and by providing educational resources about Judaism and food, they use the institutions of the Jewish community to promote ethical food consumption. Next week we are being taught by their (British!) founder, Nigel Savage. Our summer will with all of us participating Hazon's biggest annual event, their sponsored bike ride ending at the JCC in Manhattan.
This is how my American Jewish farming adventure is going so far. Even though I have not decided to exchange any current plans for a career in farming, this programme is so valuable for my life as someone that eats. And is giving me many more experiences along the way...
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