Farm Walk Is Shear Joy for City Slickers

Three-year-old Samantha Thomson of Simi Valley got to see something Sunday that suburbanites don’t see every day--sheep being sheared.

“The jacket is coming off,” observed Samantha, as herdsman Bill Langer completed the job of shearing a 120-pound sheep.

“It’s funny watching her reaction on something like this,” said Linnea Thomson, Samantha’s mother.

The Thomson family was among the more than 5,000 suburbanites and city slickers from the Valley and surrounding areas who got a taste of life on the farm Sunday at the second annual Farm Walk at Pierce College.

The event, which was hosted by the school’s agriculture department, took place on the rolling hills and green pastures of the community college’s 200-acre teaching farm in Woodland Hills.

After the shearing, onlookers were allowed to touch the sheep.

“It feels smooth and oily,” said Robin Reager of Agoura.

In addition to sheep-shearing, there were other demonstrations such as cow-milking, haystack-making and turning manure into fertilizer, said Dick South, chairman of the Pierce agriculture department.

Throughout the event, furry and feathery farm animals such as cattle, goats, pigs, chickens and horses were stroked and fed by the visitors.

“It’s an afternoon of family fun, but the Farm Walk is also intended to introduce people to the agriculture department at Pierce,” South said.

The festivities also included the “Run for the Farm” 5K and 10K races, sponsored by Pierce’s agriculture department, the West San Fernando Valley Rotary and the West Valley Eagles Track Club.

Tommy Leon, 32, of Canoga Park beat the field of 500, taking first place in both runs.

In the women’s competitions, Agoura Hills residents Lari Nusinov, 37, won the 5K, and Elizabeth Kelly, 32, won the 10K.

Proceeds from the event will benefit the college’s agriculture department and the track and cross-country trail, South said.