My Morning at Big Moon Farm

Today was my visit to Big Moon Farm in Leesville, SC. This is where my vegetables starting in the spring will come from. I joined the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) at Big Moon for the 2010 growing seasons and wanted to go out to the farm to visit, meet the Oxner family who own the farm, and most importantly let my almost 3 year old see where her veggies will come from.

The visit didn’t disappoint. The Oxners are relatively new at the CSA business but John Oxner has a lot of agriculture experience having worked for the Clemson extension and still consulting farmers. The farm has been in the family for at least three generations.
John showed us the fields and animals and talked to us about how they came to form a CSA. Being a dad of young ones he took extra care with my daughter and spent time showing my her seeds in the packing shed, seedlings in the greenhouse, and much to her joy even let her gather warm eggs from the chicken coops.

I am no farm expert. I do however read a lot about sustainable farms. I know that I will happily eat the food from Big Moon. The chickens have a nice area to run around inside and out. This allows them to forage for grubs and bugs in addition to the specialized food they are fed. From the little I know, this creates a healthy egg richer in nutrients. Plus, I really want to support farmers who treat their animals humanely and not big factory farms that house egg layers in cages so small they can’t even turn around.

Big Moon farm also raise cattle. They sell their humanely raised pastured cows along with the produce and eggs. The cows are pastured and supplemented with grain. John says he supplements with grain to produce a more tender meat. A traditional pastured cow who eats only grass takes significantly longer to get to processing weight, and an older cow is a less tender cow. His cows looked happy and healthy and were curious enough to come up and greet us at the fence. I always rethink my desire to eat these beautiful animals when I look eye to big brown eye with them. I do feel much better about my desire to be a carnivore when I know they were taken care of like God designed the animal human relationship to be and the Oxner’s are doing just that.

I encourage all my friends to find a CSA farm or a local farmer at a market to support and then go meet your farmers. We need to be informed about what goes on with our food, who grows it, and how they grow it. Plus, it brings you back to a place where you are reminded of what food should be: fresh and healthy, not boxed or premade and frozen. I know many of us are short on time and boxed pre-packaged meals are easy but we put energy into things that are important in our lives and food isn’t just important it fuels everything else in life. I find I can make do prep all one day to make cooking in the evenings quicker. More and more science is proving we are what we eat. So be a living vibrant fresh and humane person.

Update: This morning we cooked some of the eggs our daughter gathered at Big Moon Farm yesterday. WOW….I mean WOW. Now, we are no stranger to fresh local free range eggs, actually that is all we buy. We have seen bright orange yolks that are firm but these eggs were like super eggs. Yolks so bright and firm that I had to pierce it repeatedly to break. I could have picked it up out of the bowl with my hand to separate the whites and our omelets were about a shade lighter then the cheddar that filled it. I was so impressed that I wanted to share a picture. Happy eating!