Olena knows the names of all 30 of her goats. Her neighbors are amazed at how she manages it. But she jokes, “It’s just like remembering the names of the kids in your class! Is that so hard?”.
All the animals ended up at the “Bila Dolyna” eco-farm in different ways: some were purchased by Olena, some were given to her by their former owners, and some were rescued by animal volunteers. The one thing that unites these thirty goats, two horses, several donkeys, and a twenty-year-old pony is that here they will spend the rest of their natural lives surrounded by love and care. And for that, they need free grazing during the warm season and a sufficient supply of hay for the wintertime.
We arrived just as the arrangement of electric fences on the goat pasture was being reconfigured. These animals are excellent at jumping over obstacles, so they can only be herded under human supervision or by equipping the pasture with a denser than usual electric fence.
Olena was the first in her village to start using electric-fence enclosures. This system is safe for animals, but the low voltage applied to the fence trains them to stay within the enclosure. In addition to the electric current, bright stripes have been added to the fence to prevent the animals from accidentally touching it and to help them adapt to the boundaries of their designated pasture. This technology appealed to other farmers living near the eco-farm, and they adopted this approach.
Although the farmer says that she runs a microfarm, she needed 10.5 hectares of land to support such many animals; 8.5 hectares of this land are municipally owned and used under a lease agreement. To meet the farm’s needs within a limited area, even leased pastures and hayfields must be stocked with a good forage base, meaning they must have an optimal mix of different plants. Olena is one of the female farmers whom Ecoaction and the Rural Women’s Business Network are assisting with consultations to improve grass diversity and address other issues related to the efficient and nature-friendly use of her pastures.
On the land the farmer uses as pastures and hayfields, meadow ecosystems have been conserved, and Red Book-listed orchid species – Early Marsh-orchid (Dactylorhiza incarnata) – is growing here, on the wetter part of the meadow. Moderate grazing helps maintain open ecosystems and also combat invasive boxelder maple (Acer negundo), thistles, and other unwanted plants, which the goats happily eat along with other vegetation.
However, Olena wants to improve the quality of the grass cover on a part of her pastures so that, in addition to grazing, it can produce enough hay for her animals. More importantly, she plans to do this without plowing up the pastures that would be destructive for their biodiversity, but by oversowing the area with forage grasses. Another challenge is buttercup (Ranunculus), which is spreading rapidly across the plot and is potentially toxic to horses, especially in large quantities. Based on the results of his visit, Ivan, a consultant engaged by the Rural Women’s Business Network, will develop a plan of action for Olena to improve the vegetation composition of her pastures and replace the unwanted buttercups with more nutritious species.
Unfortunately, it is not easy to systematically improve the forage composition on municipal pastures, as the boundaries of the plots the farmer was granted for use have constantly changed, and the process of finalizing lease documents has dragged on for years. Back in 2024, the farmer submitted applications to lease two 5-hectare plots and repeatedly agreed to compromises so that the process could finally be completed. But even after the plots were included into the land registry, their boundaries have not been marked on the ground, creating the risk of future conflicts with neighbors.
In addition to the community’s leased land, Olena uses plots of former vegetable gardens as pastures. Due to past disturbances to the soil cover on these plots, annual fleabane (Erigeron annuus) – an invasive species that goats, however, readily eat – has spread extensively. Therefore, a solution to the problem of this species’ spread could be a combination of grazing, periodic mowing of the area, and reseeding with native grass species, such as red clover (Trifolium pratense), common meadow-grass (Poa pratensis), and Valais fescue (Festuca valesiaca).
Olena’s farm in the Pyriatyn community can serve as a positive example of civic engagement and pasture restoration. In the future, the farmer plans to transform her farm into a space for the rehabilitation of veterans – both men and women – by involving them in connecting with nature and dairy production.
Ecoaction, together with the Swedish Society for Nature Conservation (SSNC) and the Rural Women’s Business Network, with support of the Swedish Institute, is implementing the project to support women farmers engaged in pasture-based livestock farming. We support the realization of their rights, including strengthening their access to land, water, biodiversity, and other resources.
