Siskiyou Crest Goat Dairy- Jacksonville, OR by Diane

August 7, 2007

After our tour of Pennington Farms and Full Circle Bison Ranch, we headed out to the Siskiyou Crest Goat Dairy , which is in the town of Jacksonville, Oregon. Our host co-owner Michael Moss (aka Mooki) and his farm manager Stu took us around the 64-acre goat farm, which consists of a lot of happy goats and a fairly large tract of land for them to roam around on, as well as three acres of land for vegetable production (which are then sold through CSA - community supported agriculture).

Mooki is another one of the young farmers we've met on this trip. He'd tried college but found it unchallenging, had been doing row cropping for several years but was burning out, but stumbled across goat farming and fell in love with it. It was also a necessity on his farm because water is too scarce for a lot of vegetable production.

He also believes that change will come through the land, through the people that farm it and work with it, and connect with it. And he might have a point. It seems that the people we've met so far on this trip have a different outlook on life than a lot of people in places like New York. They don't do what they do for money - they do it because they're passionate about it. And part of all the passion is eating local and sustainable.

Siskiyou Dairy is a goat farm. I've never spent anytime with goats, and, I have to say, they're adorable. And the baby goats were absolutely precious. They'd come over and rub their head against you so you would pet them, and they were small and cute and just huggable.

The dairy finds home for the babies (if you never thought about it, the way we get cow or goat's milk is after a female has a child and is lactating.) And not all places can say they do that.

The dairy then takes the goat milk and hand makes artisanal goat cheese. We had some with dinner, and it was spectacular.

In addition to raising goats and doing CSA, the dairy provides educational programs to both kids and adults. Anyone is welcome to tour the farm.

We were actually there to relax after a long day at the farmers market and on farm tours, so we didn't take an extensive tour of the land. Rather, we were joined by Mary Ellen from the market, Wendy from THRIVE and Karen from the Oregon farming project, as well as Michael's father and some friends. We sat out on the farm and talked - about sustainability, farming, and all the usual stuff foodies talk about, but we also talked about more philosophical things. It wasn't anything important to put in this blog post, but what was important about it was that we all connected with each other, all based on our passion with food.

Food not only brings us together, it reconnects us with each other. Michael has a farm like that. And I can only hope that we meet many more people with this type of passion and vision.

Want to read more about our events today?

Pennington Farms
Iron Pie Competition
Full Circle Bison Ranch

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