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Join us for the country's largest farm tour!
*Saturday & Sunday, April 24 & 25
*1-5 pm
*40 Farms for $25 in advance
*$30 day of or $10 per car per farm
*The Piedmont Farm Tour is a benefit for the Carolina Farm Stewardship
Check out an interactive Google Map of the participating farms by clicking here!
With interest in local, organic and healthy food at an all-time high, Piedmont residents are eager to get out on farms and see how their food is grown.
This year the tour will feature forty outstanding examples of sustainable farming and gardening. The tour includes farms and farming projects in Orange, Chatham, Durham, Person, Alamance and Caswell Counties
Reflecting the popularity of the local and organic food movement, last year the tour set a record of 13,000 farm visits over two days, making this the largest sustainable farm tour in the country.
“This tour is a perfect way for everyone to learn where their food comes from,” said Roland McReynolds, CFSA Executive Director. “Children especially need to learn early that food doesn’t originate from the supermarket.”
A major part of the tour is the organic produce farms and community gardens growing fruits and vegetables with sustainable methods. Examples include certified organic Harland Creek Farm, certified biodynamic Whitted Bowers Farm and the Anathoth Garden run by a Methodist Church group. Tour-goers can learn exactly how these farms grow bountiful food without chemicals.
These farms offer a great way for gardeners to learn food growing tips from expert farmers. “We also have a number of tour-goers who are thinking about starting a small farm or organizing a farm project. Folks come from as far as California to see what is happening here,” said McReynolds. The tour features the farm incubator program at the Breeze Farm and the farm education programs of Central Carolina Community College, both national models.
The tour also features livestock on many farms. These days more and more consumers are concerned about animal welfare – the tour highlights humane treatment of farm animals and partners with the Animal Welfare Institute. “Once you see a cute piglet nuzzling its mother, you understand how crazy our factory farm system has become. Animals you see on our tour can express their God-given natural behaviors.”
Children especially enjoy seeing the animals. Commented McReynolds: “What child doesn’t love meeting friendly ducks and piglets and lambs? It brings their childhood books to life. Adults like it, too.”
The explosion in interest in local and healthy organic foods in recent years has encouraged more families to see farms in person. Attendance at the tour has doubled in the past few years.
Interest in food safety spurs interest in local and organic food
The tour highlights the enhanced safety of a local food system. In recent times, food recalls and contamination scares have been in the headlines constantly. A local food system offers the public the chance to purchase food directly from farmers, rather than from a producer far away.
“Why buy spinach from a California farmer you’ve never met, when spinach is available at the farmers market from a farmer you can look in the eye?” says McReynolds.
Tour-goers can learn about the benefits of grass-fed, pasture-raised meats, which are growing fast in popularity. Some experts believe that meat from large, unhygienic feedlots is partly responsible for the rise of dangerous e. coli outbreaks. This year the tour includes buffalo for the first time.
Tour organizers encourage carpooling to save gas and take advantage of the carload pricing. Each carload pays $25 in advance or $30 at the farms – for the entire tour. Or participants can pay $10 per farm per carload.
Tickets are available online at www.carolinafarmstewards.org. An online map shows the location and features of all forty farms. On April 1, printed maps and tickets will be available at all Weaver Street Market locations (Downtown Carrboro, Downtown Hillsborough and Southern Village in Chapel Hill.) Tickets will also be available at the Durham Farmers Market, Harmony Farms in Raleigh, Chatham Marketplace in Pittsboro and other locations.
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