If you don’t live on a farm, you can pretend you do, for a day.
On Saturday, Oct. 8, seven Saratoga County farms will be expecting visitors during a drive-it-yourself farm tour from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
“The reason we’re doing the tour is we want to highlight agriculture in Saratoga County, the diversity of agriculture,” said Dave Leggett, extension community educator at the Cornell Cooperative Extension, host of the event.
The farms included on the tour are Hanehan’s Pumpkins, Schuyler Farms and Mill Creek Farm in the Town of Saratoga; General Bailey Homestead Farm and Joy of the Journey Farm in the Town of Greenfield; and Lladybug Llamas and Willow Marsh Farm in the Town of Ballston.
“We have, in the seven farms, a good diversity of products and of what is representative of agriculture in Saratoga County,” said Leggett.
Chrissey and Chris Eberhardt live in a log home on their farm, Joy of the Journey Farm, where they raise 18 Nubian Goats, 50 layer chickens and English Shepherd dogs. Some of the goats are milked daily so Chrissey Eberhardt can make organic goat milk body products.
“I use our goat milk to make body products using all organic ingredients,” said Eberhardt, who sells her wares at area farmers markets.
Eberhardt said she started making her own body products because she’s not a fan of commercial ones.
“I do it because I can’t trust the government and what they say out there; the commercial world lies to you, they label incorrectly and don’t care about the people,” said Eberhardt. “All they care about is making the money.”
Eberhardt is hoping to use the farm tour as a chance to share her soap products with visitors and discuss the importance of living organically and buying local.
“I like seeing the community; I try to educate as we go along,” said Eberhardt. “So many people want to know why we’re doing that and not just buying at Price Chopper so I’ll explain the differences in quality,” said Eberhardt.
The farm will also have fresh eggs for sale and animals to visit with.
“If the weather holds out I’ll have someone demonstrate cooking on an outside pit … crafts like weaving and candle dipping,” said Eberhardt. “If rain comes it might change things a bit.”
Joy of the Journey Farm is different than its neighbors, said Eberhardt.
“Most of the farms in Greenfield are horse farmers, so we are dairy goat farmers,” said Eberhardt. “We feed organically and some others do not.”
Eberhardt always loved goats and said before the farm became a business in 2006, she’d planned to just have a few goats for sustainability. Then customers at the farmers market started requesting eggs and the farm and clientele grew.
By next year, the Eberhardts hope to have a plant up and running for processing milk and cheese.
“We’ll see what we come up with,” said Eberhardt.
Willow Marsh Farm in Ballston Spa is one of the few dairies in New York State that’s licensed to sell raw milk. Tour visitors can purchase the raw milk, homemade cheeses and yogurts and get a tour of the milk room to see how cows are milked, said Darlene Curtiss, who runs the farm with her husband Chuck.
Curtiss said the farm hopes to have its own creamery in the future and currently has a self-service farm store where people can buy raw milk, meat, eggs and other dairy products. Willow Marsh also raises beef and veal, hay, compost and vegetables.
No two farms on the tour are quite the same, said Leggett.
Mill Creek Farm is a thoroughbred farm that serves clients from all over the U.S., representative of Saratoga’s prominent equine culture.
Schuyler Farms in Schuylerville operates along the growing agri-tourism line of business, offering a 7-acre corn maze, hayrides, a pumpkin patch, a petting zoo, children’s activities and more.
Lladybug Llamas and General Bailey Homestead Farm are fiber farms. Lladybug Llamas raises and boards 18 llamas and sells alpaca products. There will be weaving demonstrations and hand-woven goods for sale. General Bailey Homestead Farm raises colored sheep for spinning fiber and yarn.
Hanehan’s Pumpkins is a farm just right for the season, selling fall produce and seasonal staples like pumpkins, winter squash, gourds, mums and Indian corn.
The drive-it-yourself aspect of the tour is to make it more relaxed and enjoyable, said Leggett.
“When people can just drive around and go to the places themselves at their leisure, I think it makes it easier for people to make the decision to go take a nice Saturday ride and stop at these farms when they know the farms are expecting visitors,” said Leggett.
The farm tour is a business move, too.
“Obviously, the business we’re in … is the education business and most of the time we work with the farms to help develop their market,” said Leggett. “If we want our farmers to succeed then they have to market their products and if they can’t market them they’re obviously not going to be in business over the long haul.”
A full list of farms and descriptions is available at www.saratogafarms.com
