From business executive to organic farmer

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/01/garden/life-on-the-farm-e-i-e-i-oh.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0

Life on the Farm: E-I-E-I ...Oh?

Boardroom to Barnyard: Tara Smith, a California business woman, traded in her plush city life for the hard work of starting a farm from scratch.

By SANDY KEENAN

Published: July 31, 2013   

Petaluma, Calif. — Tara Smith does not mind squealing on herself about the mistakes she has made since becoming a farmer at 47.

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Drew Kelly for The New York Times

Clockwise from top left, biodynamic pigs, chicks, laying hens and cattle raised on Tara Smith's 300-acre spread in Sonoma County, Calif. More Photos »

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Early on, she kept the runts of a litter of pigs, not realizing they could not survive beyond a few months, even with all her nurturing. And at day’s end, utterly spent, she would scramble around like a madwoman trying to catch the chickens to get them safely inside their hilltop shelters, a frantic dance that did not stop until a neighboring farmer patiently explained that they would go in on their own once the sun set.

Spend time on her 300-acre spread here in Sonoma County — an old dairy farm with an 1860s farmhouse — and the former marketing and sales executive will confide in her rambling but charming way that, yes, farming is hard, but it can be awe-inspiring, too.