Before heading to the New York State Sheep and Wool Festival 2021, we did a farm visit to speak with one of the participants of that grand event. Siri Swanson (sheep shearer, farmer, butcher, educator and overachiever, among other things) gave us a tour of Yankee Rock Farm. When she and her partner Colin are not running around the country shearing sheep, she plies her farming trades on three or four different sites near the Green Mountains of Vermont. She has to do multiples in order to make it work, and “work” is the operative word. The beautiful four-legged residents she raises include both Border Leicesters and Finn Sheep, and (speaking of multiples) we learned some interesting new ways to increase the sheep population quickly. For this one we had to think intensely to remember what comes after “quads.”
Rhinebeck is over, but the interviews are not. This one is one that gives us hope for the future of agriculture, and the new generation of people who do it.
Links:
https://www.yankeerockfarm.com/
https://www.virtual.sheepandwool.com/41
https://web.archive.org/web/20130718022110/http://hhr.highlands.com/default.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudson_River
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Tear_of_the_Clouds
https://darrp.noaa.gov/hazardous-waste/hudson-river
https://www.epa.gov/superfund/what-superfund
https://www.nps.gov/places/hudson-river-valley-national-heritage-area.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/US_Airways_Flight_1549