Piglets.

‘Tis the Season.

Piglets on a farm in Shelburne:

…here with Mom.

Here without:

…eating everything green it could find:

And accompanied by every barnyard’s Overseer:

They’re cute little buggers, but when they get bigger they’ll be delicious.

This is the reality of farm life.  Raise it, kill it, eat it, don’t get overly attached.  And please understand that that’s very different from not appreciating the part our prey plays in our lives.  If we’re carnivores, if we eat beef or pork or poultry, we couldn’t do better than patronizing the family farms dotting our countryside.  Locally, it’s not cages and cubicles, it’s not force-feeding of the wrong stuff.  It’s green grass and sunshine and attentive care from people who are committed to something much more sustainable than Factory Farms.

Cute piggies become delicious pork, and fuzzy chicks end their days on a spit over a barbecue pit. It’s called a “food chain,” and we’re a link in it.  Understanding that is important to either accepting it or changing it.