Goats Go for a Ride

This article includes a short video of goats going for a ride in Dummerston, Vermont, May 22. The farmer in the video is Elizabeth Wood of the New Leaf CSA. www.NewLeafCSA.com The goats are Dakar and Orion, both male. They live on pasture and sometimes they get to visit the female goats. "That's very exciting for them," Wood said. Wood makes goat cheese and sells Nigerian dwarf goat kids and her organic vegetables, flowers, herbs, and pasture-raised bacon and eggs.

Hadley Residents Asked to Act Today to Save Farmland

These photos, taken March 17, show three ways that farmland has been used in Hadley, Mass. They show McMansions, the "Mountain Farms" strip mall, and an unprotected farm. Activists are proposing a fourth way for western New England: buy and bulldoze rundown single family houses near existing downtowns and replace them with energy efficient, multi-family housing, while permanently protecting farmland from development. Government policies can encourage stores to be built in and near downtowns so people can reach them on foot, or by bicycle or public transit, instead of by car.

Vermont Town Acts to Save Farmland

Voters at Dummerston town meeting March 3 decided to put $10,000 into the town's farmland protection fund. About 200 people were at the meeting. The money can be used to buy land, or to buy development rights.

"This will help the town get money from other sources like the Vermont Land Trust," resident Bill Schmidt said during debate about the measure at the meeting.