03-19-2011, 08:42 PM
well this is new to me! from the Boston Globe...
rest of story here:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont...nd/?page=1
WAITSFIELD, Vt. — Big, strong, wooly, and ornery, Dolores the yak is named for a sadistic witch, and justifiably so. She once hoisted a 5-year-old boy on her long, sharp horns and tossed him over her back. She pinned an 8-year-old girl to a barn door. She knocked over her owner — the children’s father — and when he tried to get up knocked him over again.
For these random acts of violence, this shaggy rogue was neither put down nor sent to the barn without hay. Instead, Dolores became part of the lore shared by the hardy few Americans who herd yaks for a living. Each one you talk to has a yaks-behaving-badly story. Each one has asked him- or herself the question: Who’s herding whom?
Dolores is one of 40 yaks that belong to five farmers who brought the feisty bovids to the rolling glens of the Green Mountains. Their venture, Vermont Yak Company, aims to satisfy the growing appetite for exotic food that is locally raised, grass-fed, and free-roaming.
The farmers are part of a small but building movement of enthusiasts in the United States who value the yak for its lean meat — one-sixth the fat of grain-fed beef and 40 percent more protein.
Other exotic animals have caught on with niche audiences — bison burgers and ostrich jerky have their fans across the country — but none has gone so far as to replace the beef steer. The yak farmers do not expect to do that either — they know yak meat, with its sweet, slightly gamy taste, is not for everyone — but they figure they will attract the curious and a core market of locavores.
Yaks, which evolved in the Himalayas, make a certain amount of sense in Vermont, with its chilly climate and limited grazing land. They do not require warm barns and can thrive in fields where grass is sparse.
But ask herders what they like best about their yaks and they wax on about the individual personalities of animals that are curious like cats, spirited like ponies, and capable of far more mischief than one might expect from a ruminant cousin of the dairy cows that used to roam Vermont Yak’s 24 acres.
“Every day is different,’’ said Rob Williams, one of Vermont Yak Company’s founders. “Some days I call and they come. Some days they are like, ‘No, we’ll just stay here.’’’
rest of story here:
http://www.boston.com/news/local/vermont...nd/?page=1
WAITSFIELD, Vt. — Big, strong, wooly, and ornery, Dolores the yak is named for a sadistic witch, and justifiably so. She once hoisted a 5-year-old boy on her long, sharp horns and tossed him over her back. She pinned an 8-year-old girl to a barn door. She knocked over her owner — the children’s father — and when he tried to get up knocked him over again.
For these random acts of violence, this shaggy rogue was neither put down nor sent to the barn without hay. Instead, Dolores became part of the lore shared by the hardy few Americans who herd yaks for a living. Each one you talk to has a yaks-behaving-badly story. Each one has asked him- or herself the question: Who’s herding whom?
Dolores is one of 40 yaks that belong to five farmers who brought the feisty bovids to the rolling glens of the Green Mountains. Their venture, Vermont Yak Company, aims to satisfy the growing appetite for exotic food that is locally raised, grass-fed, and free-roaming.
The farmers are part of a small but building movement of enthusiasts in the United States who value the yak for its lean meat — one-sixth the fat of grain-fed beef and 40 percent more protein.
Other exotic animals have caught on with niche audiences — bison burgers and ostrich jerky have their fans across the country — but none has gone so far as to replace the beef steer. The yak farmers do not expect to do that either — they know yak meat, with its sweet, slightly gamy taste, is not for everyone — but they figure they will attract the curious and a core market of locavores.
Yaks, which evolved in the Himalayas, make a certain amount of sense in Vermont, with its chilly climate and limited grazing land. They do not require warm barns and can thrive in fields where grass is sparse.
But ask herders what they like best about their yaks and they wax on about the individual personalities of animals that are curious like cats, spirited like ponies, and capable of far more mischief than one might expect from a ruminant cousin of the dairy cows that used to roam Vermont Yak’s 24 acres.
“Every day is different,’’ said Rob Williams, one of Vermont Yak Company’s founders. “Some days I call and they come. Some days they are like, ‘No, we’ll just stay here.’’’
![[Image: vermont.jpg]](http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/images/usa/vermont.jpg)