EFLAND -- Ten years ago, walking around a certain 61-acre parcel of land in Efland was more like off-roading. All you could see were overgrown weeds and trees coming out of nutritionally parched soil that had been slashed and burned several times in previous decades.

Ben Bergmann and Noah Ranells, then N.C. State University professors teaching and researching agro-forestry and soil science, could see much more.

They could see goats, sheep, cows and chickens grazing free on pastures and garden patches full of vegetables and fruits.

They could see Fickle Creek Farm.

Today Fickle Creek Farm regularly sells at Western Wake, Durham, South Estes and Eno River farmers' markets. The farm is best-known for offering pasture-raised beef, poultry, pork, eggs and produce.

The year 2009 has been a big one for Bergmann and Ranells. It's their 10th running Fickle Creek and their 20th together. They brought in two interns and hired Bryan Horton, a trained chef, full-time to handle the three gardens.

"Here we still are," Bergmann said, as bleating ewes and lambs grazed nearby in the shade. "Both of us have lived and worked all over the world. Noah speaks five languages. We both speak Spanish. But we never could have imagined we'd wind up here. We'd always assumed we'd be living internationally or something. It's not a complaint. ... We've always had an interest in development, but that's important here, too. Building a sustainable local food system, that's development."

Ten years ago, to even contemplate growing produce, they needed animals to roam free, eat grass and weeds, trample shrubs and trees that needed clearing and poop to pump up the nutrition in the soil. Fickle Creek wanted to do things with no chemical and as little mechanical input as possible. They wanted to rebuild naturally.

They started with goats. For four years, they'd steer 50 to 60 goats into a quarter-acre area to graze and trample down the area until it was bare. Then Bergmann and Ranells would move them to another patch.

Chickens came next, trading areas with the goats for the next two years, eating bugs and grain, pooping, then scratching the natural fertilizer into the nutritionally parched soil.

Pigs were brought in for meat but also because they feast on some nasty weeds that normally would require herbicide to kill. Finally, the cows came home.

A farm's full circle

The farm's dogs, Boomer, Maggie, Sally, Bruno and Jack, protect 700 chickens for meat, a thousand laying hens giving 800 eggs each day, 50 ewes, 50 lambs, a ram, 38 pigs and 21 steers. The owners also cultivate three areas with a long list of vegetables. Guests at their two-room bed-and-breakfast feast on all that bounty.

Fickle Creek lives the "buy local" part of the equation, too. The farm buys its steers from the Chapel Hill Creamery eight miles away and its pigs from Elysian Fields 15 miles away.

In year 10, the process came full circle. Bergmann and Ranells just shipped their last three goats to the butcher. The steers and lambs will handle mowing from now on. The men still need to bring in feed for their chickens but plan to reduce the number they raise as soon as the soil is strong enough.

Ranells said Bergmann, who still teaches ag classes at NCSU and Central Carolina Community College, has always kept good records to help them figure out whether what they raised or grew was profitable and suitable to their farm. "What's really important for the small farmer is not overextending," said Ranells, who also serves as the agriculture economic development coordinator for Orange County. "You have to find a product that suits the farmer and suits the market. We've been very fortunate."

The lifestyle suits them because they stay close with customers who've been buying from them since they were selling eggs out of a hatchback at the Durham Athletic Park.

They've seen people clamor more and more for locally grown, organic or naturally raised meat and vegetables. Bergmann and Ranells used to field customer questions such as, "What does organic mean?" Now, the questions are, "What's in season? What would go well with this lamb?"

Running a farm, after years of teaching about it, fits their life philosophy, too.

"What does it for me," Bergmann said, "is knowing we're producing high-quality food, in a humane way for animals, in a minimal impact way for the environment that goes to sustain people in our community."