Mary Lake is a sheep farmer and sheep shearer and itinerant slaughterer. She is a tall, muscular woman in bib overalls and a baseball hat and dangly earrings she carved out of a ram’s horn. She wears a chain around her waist with a scabbard full of knives. And she loves sheep, which is one reason she participates in their slaughter. This is a story about where food comes from.
** The first version of this story aired on Vermont Public. I am grateful to Vermont Public for allowing me to share this story with Rumble Strip listeners!
Mary Lake’s business is Can-Do Shearing in Tunbridge, Vermont
Thank you Amelia Meath!!
I’m so moved by the respect Mary shows for the sheep. I wanna buy her lamb meat! How do I do that?
I don’t know but I will pass this on to Mary!
Hi Lynn. What’s your email?
Hi Erica. After listening to this episode I said to myself out loud, “I think this is the best f’ing podcast.” I spent 2 months working on a ranch in Argentina watching gauchos slaughter goats up close, and listening to Mary’s story brought me right back to that time almost 20 years ago. I was truly transfixed. The way you tell stories makes me feel like I’m there in person watching them play out in real time. Thank you for bringing them to light.
We’ll thanks for making my day Merek.
So happy to have found your site! We once had a small farm until it became too much work for us. We sold raw milk, eggs, meat birds that we slaughtered, veal, lamb, many items that Margaret created in her kitchen along with her cooking classes.
The last year or so we processed, marketed and delivered our own yogurt, this was my big mistake, we couldn’t compete price wise and by this time I was 70 years old, we were so tired!
We tried Florida for two winters but missed our native state so much, we are not going back!
Thank you!
What a wonderful interview! You both did a great job telling this story. I wish that I knew Mary when I was raising sheep. Such a fantastic philosophy and work ethic.
If it wasn’t for Mary, we wouldn’t raise sheep. I wouldn’t trust anyone else to do right by them when it’s time to transition them to feeding my family and others.
Having the privilege of working with Mary over the last 10 years has been absolutely invaluable to our small sheep (and vegetable) farm. (It’s a hobby not a business). She has helped us slaughter and skin many lambs (and a few ewes). She works with palpable kindness, skill, and mindfulness. And her clear eyed approach to what it means to feed ourselves by taking the lives of animals that were bred, born, and raised on our little patch of Vermont grass has given us the courage to continue with this project of honoring the resources that we are so fortunate to have. I think that if we all knew of the sacrifices and costs required to live in modern society then we collectively would make much better choices for ourselves, our families, and our world. Keep up the good work, Mary!
this is going to make not much sense. but i guess Rumble Strip is my church. and this podcast in particular
is holy and sacred space.
i am 77 yrs old, live now on a hill in california with a small herd…15, dairy goats that began many years ago
in New Mexico. began with goals and dreams that due to circumstance didn’t happen. But here we are.
All of us, eldering together. There is a 5 year old great granddaughter learning Goats, it feeling like
she was “born for it”. the moral dilemma. how do we imagine a future as species living with and among
species on this planet.
i have listened 5 times since last night. Thank you Erica and Thank YOU Mary Lake.
Thank you Grace. I appreciate this so much. And I think being 77 living on a hill in California with goats sounds like a TRIUMPHANT LIFE. It sounds lovely. And I’m glad to have you with me for the strange science project that is Rumble Strip. All best to you Grace, Erica
I loved listening to this, I resonate so much with pretty much everything Mary had to say. I’m 10 years into raising goats and processing our own wethers, plus pigs, chickens, etc. The anxiety about money and if this is the right thing for my human children, and obviously I’m trying to be part of saving the world. I felt seen. Similarly with the huge love for the animals and the sort of confusion around why the vegans and I end up in such different places when we both love animals and want to be part of protecting the environment. Oh, I also just loved to hear the competence and joy in doing the work. Erica, I appreciate your decisions to keep the sounds and the experience rooted in reality without sensationalism.
Cheers from a fellow farmer,
Mae
Thank you so much Mae. I love this comment. Thanks for taking the time to write it.
Mary is what we wish and hope all meat growers strive for. She is so respectful and gentle of the sheep she has raised and is processing.