Kid stuff? Pirri family of Fairfield work to establish their goat dairy, Sherman Farms

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FAIRFIELD – Abigail Pirri sat in the goat pen delivering moment-by-moment birth reports on a Nubian goat named Getaway.

“She’s grinding her teeth,” Abigail, 11, shouted, which is a sign of stress in goats.

“She’s digging a hole,” she reported, another sign of impending birth.

“I think she will have triplets,” she definitively announced.

Abigail’s mom, Dawn Pirri, looked over the wall of the pen, monitoring both the dairy goat and her daughter. “It may be hours yet,” she said.

Another daughter, Grace, 7, had already left the barn to read. A third daughter, Sarah, 15, was helping her father, Angelo Pirri, milk the family’s goat herd. The fourth daughter, Caroline, 19, had checked in earlier by telephone from classes at the University of Maine at Farmington.

This is the time of year when the kids are born.

With the soft background sounds of clucking hens and baaing goats and the smell of fresh hay hanging in the air, Dawn Pirri stood quietly for a moment, reflecting.

“This is the life we wanted,” she said Wednesday morning. “This is what we worked for.”

Farming has a reputation as hard, unforgiving work, and many times it is. But for the Pirri family, it also is a fulfilling way of life, one they worked years to realize and for which they moved from Rhode Island to Maine to find.

The family is in its second year of establishing Sherman Farms goat dairy off Route 139 in Fairfield.

“Last year, we only lost $600,” Pirri said with a quick laugh. “That’s really good. It usually takes a long time to lose that small an amount. We thought it would take us years to establish a market here.”

Through word-of-mouth, however, the customers began calling and arriving. They buy the family’s breeding stock, kids, milk, soap, fudge, yogurt (called goat-gurt) and eggs, and they call on the Pirris for kidding advice.

The Pirris’ quick rise toward success is indicative of the speed with which Maine’s dairy and meat goat breeding industry is expanding. An increased interest in food directly from the farm, concerns about medications or chemicals in cow’s milk, and the emergence of a fine line of artisan goat cheeses are pushing its success, Marge Kilkelly of the Northeast States Association for Agricultural Stewardship, an affiliate of the Council of State Governments, said Friday.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture 2002 census, the most recent figures available, indicated there were 1,663 goat farms and 20,145 goats in Maine. That was more than farm-raised deer, elk and bison populations combined. The number of farms is more than four times the number of cow dairy farms.

Kilkelly estimated that today’s individual goat count could be twice as high as just four years ago.

“Goats have a long history here in Maine. They are multifunctional and easier for small-scale producers,” she said.

“One of the unique aspects of goat farming is its low impact on the land, which is very important to the small farms of the Northeast,” the agriculture official said.

Along with an expanding dairy customer base, Maine’s herd genetics and breeding are progressing at a rapid pace, Kilkelly said.

“It used to be that goats were considered a backyard brush hog and you could pick a milking goat up for $15,” she said. “Now, we have a significant gene pool, and that same milker could cost $150 to $200.”

Recognizing that there is a solid market for goats within Maine’s ethnic communities, the University of Maine Cooperative Extension organized an annual spring auction of meat goats for the past three years. Extension educator Richard Brzozowski said Maine has a customer base of more than 6,000 people – Somalis, Jamaicans, Pakistanis and others – and the Maine meat market could handle from 500 to 900 goats a month, a quota currently being filled by farmers from New Jersey, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.

“We need to ramp up production in Maine to even begin meeting this demand,” Brzozowski said.

“When we started this [auction] project, it quickly became clear that the in-migration of ethnic populations could open up big opportunities for Maine farmers,” he said. In its first year, 200 goats were sold at the auction.

The Pirris, however, are quick to say they aren’t in the goat business for profit. They are in it for the pure, simple quality of their lives.

The couple originally lived in Rhode Island and began with a single dairy goat for milk. Slowly, their herd grew, but their customer base did not. They also owned a 1700s farmhouse that was in constant need of repair, and Angelo Pirri worked for the R.I. Department of Corrections for 20 years, a job that was wearing him down.

“We wanted a better life,” Angelo Pirri said. He milks the herd of 25 goats by machine in a barn he designed and built himself.

Watching him, Dawn Pirri reflected: “When I met him, he was such a city boy. On our first date, he wore white patent leather shoes and a wide lapel leisure jacket.”

“I never dreamed this is what I would be doing in my retirement,” Angelo Pirri said. “But I love it.”

“My children can really appreciate where things come from,” Dawn Pirri said. “So many other kids, even from barely suburban areas, have disconnected with the land and agriculture.”

It is the character-building lessons of farming that the Pirris wanted most for their children.

“Our goal never was to be totally self-sufficient through the goat dairy,” Dawn said. “Our goal was to be around goats, because we love them, and teach our children responsibility, how to follow through and build their characters. They have reconnected with the cycle of life, and the earth and nature.”

Sarah, at 15, feels the greatest lessons she has learned from farm life are teamwork and responsibility.

“I know that I cannot sleep in on a Saturday,” she said. “There are consequences. I am always busy, and I can never say I’m either done or bored. It is so rewarding.”

And the final report on Getaway? Twins – a buck and a doe – were born without complications about 1 p.m. Wednesday, March 22.

Mother and kids are doing fine.