The WFSU Ecology Blog
  • Home
    • About
    • WFSU Public Media Home
  • Documentaries
    • Red Wolf Family Celebrates First Year at the Tallahassee Museum
    • Roaming the Red Hills
    • Oyster Doctors
    • Testing the Ecology of Fear
    • EcoShakespeare
    • Stories from the Apalachicola
    • Classic WFSU Ecology Documentaries
  • Habitats
    • Estuaries
      • Oyster Reef
        • The Effects of Predators and Fear on Oyster Reefs
        • Apalachicola Oyster Research
        • Meet the Species “On (and swimming around) the Reef”
        • Oyster Reef Ecology | On the Reef
      • Salt Marsh
        • In the Grass- Salt Marsh Biodiversity Study
        • Meet the Species “In the Grass”
        • Salt Marsh Ecology | In the Grass
      • Seagrass Bed
        • Predatory Snails, and Prey, of Bay Mouth Bar
      • In the Grass, On the Reef Glossary
    • Waterways Big and Small
      • Apalachicola Basin
        • Apalachicola RiverTrek | Kayaking, Camping, & Hiking the River Basin
        • Apalachicola River and Bay
    • Longleaf Pine & Fire Ecology
  • EcoCitizen
    • Seasonality
      • phenology
    • Citizen Science
    • Home Habitat
      • Native Gardening for North Florida
      • Pollinators and Gardening
      • Backyard
        • The Backyard Bug Blog 2018
        • Backyard Blog January 2019
Kayak Adventure
Kayaking Bald Point | Adventure on a Living...
Wacissa Springs Adventure | Kayaking a Wild Florida...
Upper Chipola River Kayak Adventure | Ghosts &...
Tate’s Hell & the Apalachicola River Delta |...
Kayak Scouting Mission on the Ochlockonee Water Trail
Merritt’s Mill Pond | Kayaking and Spring Caves
Kayaking the Apalachicola River with my Four-Year-Old Son
Canoeing the Aucilla: A Red Hills River Steeped...
Raising a Kid with Nature Takes Creativity, Persistence
Father & Son Apalachicola River Kayak Adventure

The WFSU Ecology Blog

  • Home
    • About
    • WFSU Public Media Home
  • Documentaries
    • Red Wolf Family Celebrates First Year at the Tallahassee Museum
    • Roaming the Red Hills
    • Oyster Doctors
    • Testing the Ecology of Fear
    • EcoShakespeare
    • Stories from the Apalachicola
    • Classic WFSU Ecology Documentaries
  • Habitats
    • Estuaries
      • Oyster Reef
        • The Effects of Predators and Fear on Oyster Reefs
        • Apalachicola Oyster Research
        • Meet the Species “On (and swimming around) the Reef”
        • Oyster Reef Ecology | On the Reef
      • Salt Marsh
        • In the Grass- Salt Marsh Biodiversity Study
        • Meet the Species “In the Grass”
        • Salt Marsh Ecology | In the Grass
      • Seagrass Bed
        • Predatory Snails, and Prey, of Bay Mouth Bar
      • In the Grass, On the Reef Glossary
    • Waterways Big and Small
      • Apalachicola Basin
        • Apalachicola RiverTrek | Kayaking, Camping, & Hiking the River Basin
        • Apalachicola River and Bay
    • Longleaf Pine & Fire Ecology
  • EcoCitizen
    • Seasonality
      • phenology
    • Citizen Science
    • Home Habitat
      • Native Gardening for North Florida
      • Pollinators and Gardening
      • Backyard
        • The Backyard Bug Blog 2018
        • Backyard Blog January 2019
EcoAdventuresFarms and AgricultureThe Red Hills of Florida & Georgia

Sweetgrass Cheese Shop- Celebrating Farms of the Red Hills

by Rob Diaz de Villegas April 14, 2016
by Rob Diaz de Villegas April 14, 2016 0 comment

Welcome to Part 7 (of 10) of Roaming the Red Hills, which originally aired on the April 14 episode of WFSU’s Local Routes.  Through ten 3-minute videos, we’ll explore the natural soul of the Red Hills of Florida and Georgia, from the pine uplands down to its rivers, lakes, and farms.  Thanks to Tracy Horenbein for creating original compositions for this video series.  The series is narrated by Jim McMurtry. 

Funding for Roaming the Red Hills was provided by Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy.

Rob Diaz de Villegas WFSU-TV

I’m walking on a cow pasture after the rain, and the mud is sometimes hard to distinguish from the cow-pies.  My production assistant, Brian, and I set the tripod.  When we look up, a couple of hundred cows are all staring at us. Murmurations of birds make their way through the cows and into an adjacent field.  A misty sunrise unfolds behind the feed tower at Buddha Belly Dairy in Quitman Georgia.

Buddha Belly was once Green Hill Dairy, where Al and Desiree Wehner started what would become Sweetgrass Dairy (Buddha Belly is now owned by their son Clay).  The milk produced by these grass-fed cows will be made into cheese in Thomasville and sold locally or in any of 38 states where Sweetgrass cheeses are shipped.

Thomasville Tomme, a raw milk cheese produced by Sweetgrass Dairy in Thomasville, Georgia.A month earlier, I met with Clay’s sister and brother-in-law, Jessica and Jeremy Little, at the Sweetgrass Cheese Shop in Thomasville.  The Cheese Shop was hosting a lunch to benefit the Plantation Arts Festival, and new chef Wes Kent created a three course meal for a sold out crowd.

As Wes prepared the salad, he ran radishes over mandolin.  “These are from Breaking Away Farms in Meigs, Georgia.”  He sliced aji dulce peppers from Turkey Hill Farm in Tallahassee.

Sweetgrass Dairy, as a local food producer, is a member of the Red Hills Small Farm Alliance.  As a restaurant and market, the Cheese Shop uses and sells meat and produce from other member farms.  For Jessica, this emphasis on local farms goes back to her own parents’ revelations about the way they raised cows.

After raising cattle conventionally in Asheville, Florida, the Wehners decided to change to a New Zealand “rotational grazing style farm,” and moved their operation to Quitman.  They noticed a difference in the flavor of the milk, and after a few years they started making cheeses to showcase what they believed to be a superior product.

With the Cheese Shop, Jessica and Jeremy want to showcase the work that other farmers in the area have put into producing their food products.

“People are working so hard to grow this incredible produce, or to make incredible charcuterie, “Jessica said, “(Jeremy and Wes) just don’t want to mess it up, and let the products speak for themselves.”

P1110434-small

The Red Hills Small Farm Alliance

You can see shots in the video above from Turkey Hill and Full Earth Farms.  The video is from previous segments where we toured these and other Red Hills Small Farm Alliance Farms.

Roselle flowers harvested at Turkey Hill Farm in Tallahassee, FL. ROselle Flowers are used to make red zinger tea.Turkey Hill Farms/ Golden Acres Ranch Louise Divine is co-owner of Turkey Hill and co-founder of the Red Hills Small Farm Alliance.  Between clipping roselle flowers (pictured to the left, roselle flowers are used to make red zinger tea) and harvesting ginger root, she talked to us how she inadvertently started farming for a living and about what the RHSFA does for local farmers.  At Golden Acres, in Monticello, Florida, Bobby Golden introduces us to the many animals she raises, including Tennessee Fainting Goats.

Full Earth Farm in Quincy, Florida.Full Earth Farm/ Blue Ridge Farm/ Miccosukee Root Cellar Katie Harris is the other co-founder of the RHSFA, and co-owner of Full Earth Farm in Quincy, Florida.  When we visited, they were harvesting sweet potatoes and had rows of greens growing (pictured, left). At Blue Ridge Farm in Havana, Florida, Wayne Hawthorne shows us his hydroponic greenhouse.  And, at the Miccosukee Root Cellar in Tallahassee, Ruben Fields runs a farm to table restaurant using Red Hills farms.  If you watched the segment above on Local Routes, Ruben might look familiar.  You can see him playing and singing in our music segment with his band, Two Foot Level.

Come adventure with us in the Red Hills, Apalachicola River and Bay, the Forgotten Coast, and More! Subscribe to the WFSU Ecology Blog by Email.

Comments

comments

Red HillsRed Hills Small Farm AllianceSweetgrass Dairy
0 comment
0
FacebookTwitterGoogle +Pinterest
Rob Diaz de Villegas

Rob Diaz de Villegas is a senior producer for WFSU-TV, covering outdoors and ecology. Early in his television career, Rob focused on music production. After a couple of years of producing and editing Spanish and bilingual music video shows in San Antonio, Rob returned to Tallahassee in 2002 to resume production of his local music performance show, OutLoud. From that, he transitioned to local music documentaries, until one day he found himself standing in a muddy salt marsh with a camera, and his life was changed forever. Rob created this blog for a National Science Foundation funded marine biology project called In the Grass, On the Reef. No one asked Rob to expand on this work and cover all ecology in our area, but it seemed like a good thing to do. Subsequent projects under the Ecology Blog umbrella include EcoShakespeare (funded by WNET and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting) and Roaming the Red Hills (funded by Tall Timbers Research Station and Land Conservancy). His most recent documentary follows the lives of four red wolf pups born at the Tallahassee Museum, apex predators that once hunted in our local wild spaces. Rob is married with two young sons, and they try to have outdoor family adventures as often as possible (you might see them on the blog from time to time).

previous post
Lake Iamonia Duck Hunt
next post
Eluster Richardson | Painting Life on a Red Hills Tenant Farm

Related Posts

Lake Miccosukee Sinkhole Hike: Floridan Aquifer Exposed!

February 8, 2018

Kayaking Bald Point | Adventure on a Living...

January 18, 2018

Adopting an Ephemeral Wetland | Kids’ Adventures in...

June 8, 2017

Saint Vincent Island | Where Red Wolves Learn...

April 20, 2017

Choctawhatchee River Hiking on new section of the...

March 30, 2017

Into the Forest with Bruce Means and the...

March 2, 2017

Wacissa Springs Adventure | Kayaking a Wild Florida...

February 16, 2017

A Geologist’s View of the Apalachicola River |...

February 9, 2017

Remote Footprints goes deep into the Bradwell Bay...

February 2, 2017

Monarch Tagging at the St. Marks Refuge |...

February 2, 2017

Search

Subscribe

Subscribe to receive more outdoor adventures, and an in depth look at our local forests and waterways by Email.

If you do not receive a verification e-mail, check your spam folder.

Category

Twitter

Tweets by wfsuIGOR

iNaturalist

This is going to be a big part of the Ecology Blog in 2019, so WFSU Ecology Producer Rob Diaz de Villegas has been getting to know this mobile tool for identifying and recording animal species in your area.  Look for more information on iNaturalist and our 2019 project soon!

iNaturalist.org

Thumb
View robdv’s observations »

Most Recent

  • Florida Native Milkweed | Tips for Growing Your Monarch Friendly Garden
  • What is the WFSU EcoCitizen Project?
  • Four Butterfly Caterpillars You Can Easily Raise in North Florida
  • Lake Elberta Park | A Tallahassee Bird Watching Oasis
  • Shorebird Watching at Alligator Point’s Phipps Preserve

Archives

February 2019
M T W T F S S
« Jan    
 123
45678910
11121314151617
18192021222324
25262728  
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Flickr
  • Youtube

@2017 - PenciDesign. All Right Reserved. Designed and Developed by PenciDesign

test title

this is the info in my test popup.