Jenny Brown - The Lucky Ones: My Passionate Fight for Farm Animals

The Lucky Ones

The Lucky Ones

My Passionate Fight for Farmed Animals

Jenny Brown

Founder, Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary

with Gretchen Primack

AVERY

a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

New York

Published by the Penguin Group

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Copyright 2012 by Jenny Brown

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

Published simultaneously in Canada

Recipes

Page 248, Insanely Tasty VegNews Mac n Cheese: Colleen Holland (originally published in VegNews magazine); page 250, Quick Savory Nut Loaf: Adapted from The Complete Vegetarian Cuisine by Rose Elliot, Pantheon Books, New York; page 252, Almond Feta Cheese with Herb Oil: Rochelle Palermo, from Vegetarian Times, April 2009; page 254, Cashew Pumpkin Tartlets: Pamela Brown; p.255, Speedy yet Heavenly Thai Basil Sesame Noodles: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, www.peta.org; page 258, Blueberry-Lemon Corn Biscuit Cobbler: Excerpted from Vegan Pie in the Sky: 75 Out-of-This World Recipes for Pies, Tarts, Cobblers, and More, by Isa Chandra Moskowitz and Terry Hope Romero (Da Capo Lifelong, 2011).

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Brown, Jenny.

The lucky ones : my passionate fight for farm animals / Jenny Brown with Gretchen Primack.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN: 978-1-101-58888-8

1. Brown, Jenny. 2. Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary. 3. Animal sanctuariesNew York (State)Woodstock.
4. Domestic animalsNew York (State)Woodstock. 5. Animal rights activistsUnited StatesBiography.
6. Animal welfareMoral and ethical aspectsUnited States. 7. Brown, JennyChildhood. 8. Cancer in
childrenPatientsUnited StatesBiography. 9. BonesCancerPatientsUnited StatesBiography.
I. Primack, Gretchen. II. Title.

HV4716.B76A3 2012 2012010041

636.0832092dc23

[B]

Printed in the United States of America

1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2

BOOK DESIGN BY NICOLE LAROCHE

The recipes contained in this book are to be followed exactly as written. The publisher is not responsible for your specific health or allergy needs that may require medical supervision. The publisher is not responsible for any adverse reactions to the recipes contained in this book.

While the authors have made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the authors assume any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Penguin is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity. In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers; however, the story, the experiences, and the words are the authors alone.

ALWAYS LEARNING

PEARSON

To my incredible husband, Doug,
the love of my life, for making all I do possible,
and for his infinite support, love, patience,
and humor. Hes a keeper!

In memory of Julie Goodloe

I am the voice of the voiceless;
Through me the dumb shall speak,
Till the deaf worlds ear be made to hear
The cry of the wordless weak.
From street, from cage and from kennel,
From jungle and stall, the wail
Of my tortured kin proclaim the sin
Of the mighty against the frail.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (18501919),
The Voice of the Voiceless

I ts Saturday morning, and Im in Mission Control. Thats what I call my office, which is on the second story of my house and has a glorious view of the entire farm. Through the windows behind my computer, I see three white turkeys, Petunia, Beatrice, and Sphinx, pecking leftover grain in the grass. Farther out, 2,000-pound Andy the steer is tossing a pine branch up in the air with his hornspine needles are like catnip for cows. Half a dozen goats of various sizes are playing King of the Rock Pile. Rod the rooster humps a volunteers shoe (hes got a foot fetish), which cracks me up as usual. The bunnies are just a blur as they dart in and out of their habitat. Arnell the goose is honking his usual false alarm over something innocuous. Now you know why I dont need HBO.

This is Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary. My husband, Doug, and I, along with our small staff and volunteers, take care of around two hundred farm animals. They are all rescues, and they all will get to live out their natural lives in peace.

But its not all entertaining: I watch our farm manager, Sheila, lead a young sheep named Summer slowly out of her barn. Summers got an appointment four hours away at Cornell Veterinary Hospital to have her recently weakened back end X-rayed, and the whole farm is worried sick about her. Riding shotgun with Sheila will be Bruce, a rooster whose infected foot isnt healing with the usual methods. Stubby the pig is also doing poorly, and we expect a similar journey soon. We drive the four hours because vets with extensive knowledge of farm animals are few and far between. The typical farmer would simply cull the animal, the thought of a vet visit never entering his mind.

Coco, a blind chicken who shares my office, walks over and cozies up to my foot. From the looks of the blanket on the floor, shes just laid an egg, and the effort of creating a nest and laying the egg wears her out and makes her sleepy. I lean down to give her neck a stroke, and then I catch a glimpse of a car full of visitors cruising up our long gravel drive. The sanctuarys open to the public on the weekends for farm tours, and pretty soon our modest visitors center will be filled with people curious about what we do and eager to get close to animals. I love to connect visitors to the residents of Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary, WFAS for short, and its a good thing I do, since thats how Im going to spend the day. I tap on Cocos feed bowl and she perks up, using various sounds in my office to orient herself. Then I get ready to go outside.