After retiring from her role as a dairy goat at another farm, Nibblets came to Sweet Farm near Half Moon Bay to rest out her golden years. Now Nibblets, or Mama Goat as the folks at Sweet Farm sometimes call her, is put out to pasture, grazing her days away and "keeping the other goats from getting into too much trouble."
It's not every farm that makes room for animals like Nibblets, or others non-working creatures like Gizmo and Sturgis, an elderly horse and a young steer who, not boxed in or forced to work, have taken up an unlikely friendship. But that's sweet Sweet Farm, which is not, exactly, a farm at all. Instead, as CBS 5 learned in their video tour of Sweet Farm, the site is a sanctuary for farm and domestic animals who have been, in the past, forced to work or abused. In a twist that calls Orwell to mind, it's just humans who do the work at Sweet Farm of feeding and caring for animals who exist to educate visitors, according to literature from the farm, of "the importance of humane, ethical, and healthy eating in their day to day lives."
That, for Sweet Farm's founders at least, means strict veganism, although, as proprietor Nate Salpeter tells the station, he hopes to also educate "someone who eats meat and doesn’t have much of an idea about where it comes from.”
Sweet Farm is named for Anna Sweet, who runs the operation along with her husband, Salpeter. She works for Facebook while he's a nuclear engineer, and they purchased the 12-acre property along Highway 1 in 2015. Aside from their backgrounds in technology, Sweet grew up on a farm in upstate New York, and while living in Seattle, the couple volunteered at a pet rescue center.
In the end, Sweet and Salpeter would like to farm out what they learn from their work. "Coming from long career in the tech industry, co-founders Anna & Nate both recognize the impact technology can have on achieving the goals & vision of an organization," they write to their website. "In addition to directly helping animals by giving them homes on the farm in Half Moon Bay, the team intends to build software solutions that reduce overhead for other rescue organizations and maximize the amount of good they can do for animals worldwide."
Sweet Farm was incorporated as a nonprofit in March 2016, with its 501(c)3 tax-exempt status was confirmed by the IRS in August. To "change people's view on animals — how they're treated and consumed," Sweet Farm will begin hosting open houses this spring. But for those hoping to find out where their food really comes from, Sweet Farm isn't the answer: These animals are not for eating.
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