Gardener Lindsey works in my neighbor’s organic garden near Grays Chapel, south of Greensboro. The area is becoming a center of local sustainable agriculture and locally grown food.
(photographs copyright 2009 by Dan Routh)
Category: Agriculture
Still Life Product Photography
(photograph copyright 2009 by Dan Routh)
For those of you who have followed this blog, you have probably noticed that I spend a lot of time hanging around the Goat Lady Dairy in Grays Chapel. There are a couple of reasons. I live about a half mile from their operation, so they are neighbors and friends. I also really like the product they make. Recently, I have been working on shooting photography around the dairy for a website redesign they are working on. The image above shows one of the many types of goat cheese they produce weekly. The dairy is located about 18 miles south of Greensboro.
North Carolina Farmer Portrait
Portrait of my neighbor and Randolph County farmer Jack Fagg. Jack is a semi-retired farmer who raises grain, hay and straw near Grays Chapel in central North Carolina. If you live near the area and need some straw, Jack is sitting on about 4000 bales of good clean wheat straw from last year’s crop.
(photographs copyright 2009 by Dan Routh)
Raising Vegetables
My father’s cousin Thomas Routh and his wife Lula Mae live just down the road from us in Grays Chapel. In their late eighties, Thomas and Lula Mae grow a large vegetable garden each year from which they sell fresh produce at the local farmer’s market in Asheboro. Doing all the work themselves, they grow plants in their greenhouse from seed, prepare their ground, plant their plants, do all the harvesting, and sell the fresh vegetables at the market. I caught them Saturday morning as they were finishing up planting tomatoes. This year, they have about 750 tomato plants. That’s a lot of tomatoes. Of course, they also will have squash, cucumbers, potatoes, lettuce, cabbage, corn, plants and canned goods too. Lula Mae said last year she kept track of the green beans they picked, and the total came to 2300 lbs.
(photographs copyright 2009 by Dan Routh)
Scottish Highland Cattle, "Beasts"
A herd of highland cattle grazes just outside of Greensboro. Though I believe these particular cows are kept as pets, the Scottish breed is prized for it’s lean meat. The shaggy hair acts as insulation against the cold, a necessity in the cool, damp Highlands of Scotland, so the animals have less fat than standard beef cattle. Smaller in stature than regular beef cows, they have a presence nonetheless.
And yes, both the males and the females have horns.
(photographs copyright by Dan Routh)
Early Planting
I stopped by my neighbors, Goat Lady Dairy, south of Greensboro yesterday to chat and pick up some goat cheese, and photographed Steve and Lee Tate as they were planting early vegetables before the rain set in. The Tates use their garden to produce fresh organic vegetables for the farm brunches and dinners they put on at their dairy. In addition to the cheese I picked up, Steve let me try some of their fresh goat milk yogurt and it is definitely a winner. Steve an Lee are both wonderful people and are advocates of locally grown food, and they possess a world of knowledge on sustainable agriculture. They are leaders in the local slow food movement. You can find out more by visiting http://www.goatladydairy.com/
(photographs copyright 2009 by Dan Routh)
Father and Son Dairy Men
Farmers are always busy, especially dairy farmers. Every day of the year there is something that needs and has to be done. Cows have to be milked, stock fed, equipment serviced and crops brought in. But I have found that they all will take the opportunity to pause and talk to you for a few minutes about farming, the price of milk and cattle, or just the weather. Third and fourth generation dairy farmers Rick and Michael Williams take a short break before milking time on their dairy operation, Williams Dairy, south of Greensboro, North Carolina.
(images copyright 2008 by Dan Routh)
Friday from the Backyard
This is the view from my deck in the afternoons; young calves we raised for the feeder market. IE, we raise calves that we sell at about 400-500 pounds to other farmers to finish raising. Basically, our farm is a big cow nursery. Unfortunately, my wife likes to name all the cattle. Makes it harder to see them go.
And of course nearby are Marco Polo the rooster and Speckles the hen.
(images copyright 2008 by Dan Routh)
Williams Dairy
Rick Williams
About a mile from my home in North Carolina just south of Greensboro, Rick and Greg Williams operate Williams Dairy, a fourth generation family owned dairy farm. With their mother Jeanette, Rick’s wife Barbara and son Michael, and one outside employee, the Williams brothers farm over 500 acres and milk a herd of about 250 Holstein dairy cows (125 that they milk with another 125 that they are raising). They grow all their feed (which is a considerable amount, seeing that some of their cows give close to 100 pounds of milk per day), raise calves and milk twice a day, seven days a week, 365 days per year.
The Williams’ operation is rare now. At one time rural Randolph County, North Carolina was filled with family farms, but as the face of agriculture has changed and with the increase in development in the area, and the escalation of land values, working farms have gradually disappeared. Their lifestyle is like the one I grew up a part of, and I hate to see it go away. In fact, my father and their father shared equipment and labor for many years when my own family milked cows. Their grandmother was one of the best cooks in the neighborhood and she cooked huge amounts of good food daily for the farmhands. It’s a hard way to make a living, but it’s a way of life that is important and valuable, and for the Williams, it provides genuine satisfaction and independence. For that reason, I’ve decided to create an ongoing project for myself; that is, to document local family farms and businesses before they totally go away.
Greg Williams
Because of the cost involved with maintaining such a large operation and keeping the land in their family, the Williams brothers placed some of their land in the Piedmont Land Conservancy. The PLC seeks to preserve rural farmland through the use of non-development easements. Basically they buy development rights to land (which gives family farmers some value for their land), leaving the owners with the ability to continue to farm their land without having to worry about development pushing them out, and preserving large tracts of rural land for posterity. The Williams farm is in the PLC’s Liberty-Randleman Farmland Protection Corridor. My own family is hoping to do the same with our land. For more info, go to http://www.piedmontland.org/.
(images copyright 2008 by Dan Routh)
Dan Routh Photography 