Newborn lambs at Grassroots Farm & Dairy in Marshall, NC are stolen from their mothers just 5-7 days after birth. Distressed babies are relocated to be raised with other forcibly orphaned lambs their own age, never to nurse from their devastated mothers again.
In order for the mothers to become pregnant in the first place, a captive breeding ram is used to impregnate all of the females, and wears a “marker” on his body so that the farm owners can tell who he has mounted.
Their website states that they “keep our lambs on their moms for the first 30 days of their life at which point we move them out to our pastures to rotationally graze on mixed grasses and legumes throughout the summer.” But after touring this farm, we learned that newborn babies and mothers are actually separated from each other after 5-7 days. They then continue on with other lambs their own age, never to nurse from their mothers again.
Perhaps most disturbing was listening to one of the farm owners, a mother herself, explain how she has sent “milking sheep” to slaughter because “they got too rowdy” during the milking process; mothers who were confusedly grieving the babies their bodies instinctively long for and expect to feel nursing were killed for not submitting passively enough to human parasitism.
She shared this information while her own baby was hugged snug and safely to her body.
Surplus males and lambs are sent to slaughter or kept as future breeders. The website says that they “sell cuts of meat for various prices per pound and every year we offer a few whole lambs for sale. If you reserve a lamb, we take the lambs to slaughter and have them custom cut according to your liking.”
Older “milking sheep” meet the same demise. When mothers are too old to profitably lactate, they too are sent to slaughter. Just like on large commercial farms, at Grassroots Farm & Dairy bodies and reproductive systems are merely property and commodities. They also make sheepskin products from sheep who are raised at their farm so that people can use their skin as mere decorations.
They care for the animals so much at Grassroots Farm & Dairy that you can buy a rack of lambs for $20 a pound, or a ground up lambs for $13 a pound.
Grassroots Farm & Dairy currently sell their products on site, online, at the The West Asheville Tailgate Market and The North Asheville Tailgate Market. They hope to expand their products in the future and start making cheese.
Asheville Dairy 