Farms
There are scores of farms in the Northwest New Jersey Skylands, including dairy, produce markets, orchards, berry cultivators, equestrian centers, wineries, herb growers, honey producers, cheese makers. These stories profile just a few of the many places that welcome your company.
4-H Fairs
Today's clubs reflect modern trends and interests, but still emphasize the personal growth of each member
Apple Picking
A walk among ageless trees laden with the mythical fruit is a trip through a special kind of garden.
Backyard Grower: Edible Flowers
It’s easy to drive right past Stan Styer’s humble abode, unless it’s August or September, when he wheels his little wooden cart, heavily laden with fruit, flowers and vegetables, out to the road. Try some Rose Hip tea!
Backyard Orchards
A fruit tree or two or a berry patch transforms your yard from a chore to an unusual and productive edible landscape.
Baking Bread
You've heard that bread is the staff of life. That saying harkens from an earlier time, when the average American ate up to entire loaf of bread per day! How can something so right and needed become such a controversial food, and how can we know which breads are OK for us to enjoy now? Here's how!
Beekeepers in New Jersey
People keep bees for different reasons, but any successful beekeeper is a meteorologist, botanist and entomologist all at once.
Beekeeping For Beginners
When taking a walk on our property, many of our friends hesitate at the bee hives and ask Why bees?†Some days we ask ourselves the same question.
Birding on Farms
Wildlife viewers and local farmers can now benefit from a new and innovative partnership that enhances both the ecology of Northwest New Jersey and the economies of our still-rural communities.
Bobolink Dairy and Bakehouse
Cows Outside! The farm produces artisanal bread, solar-powered cheeses, and pasture-raised beef. Farm tours are also available on the weekend.
Christmas Tree Growers
Tree farmers must plan years in advance, provide year-round care, and invest time, labor, and love into a crop which takes 7-15 years from planting to harvest.
Donaldson's Greenhouses and Nursery: Edible Flowers
The impeccably arranged greenhouses and lush outdoor garden area resemble a well-manicured park. Try some Lavendar Lemonade!
Exotic Farm Animals
Where cows once grazed, mystery creatures occupy the fields. Most serve two purposes: to educate and propagate. If curiosity leads to profits, all the better.
Farmers Markets
Day and weekend trips in the autumn Skylands can also be delicious, with the rich harvests of our local farms available to the savvy shopper at farmer's markets throughout our region.
Fertile Ground
Lately, more and more of New Jersey’s edibles emerge in community gardens, which grow communities as well as good things to eat.
Field Guide
NJ Audubon’s thirty-fifth outpost, the Wattles Stewardship Center in Port Murray, is a model for blending environmental awareness, wildlife habitat, and agriculture -- and a wonderful place to take a walk!
Fields Without Fences: Edible Flowers
Fields Without Fences seeks a delicate balance between letting nature take its course and agricultural production. Try an Elderflower Cordial!
Food Preserving and Canning
Take advantage of the fall harvest, and "put up" some food for healthy, nutritious eating during the long winter months.
Forces of Nature
The early morning sun is hot as it climbs over the mountain and then falls on the plants still soaked with dew. Even though there is the mild discomfort of dust, sunburn and wet clothing, the berry pickers come early to get the biggest and ripest berries on the field. The customers picking their own strawberries arrive early but never as early as the crew which picks for the farm stand. They start just after dawn when there is still an early spring chill in the air because the stand opens early and the stock of berries must be ready.
Four Sisters Winery at Matarazzo Farms: A Taste of Summer
In August, Four Sisters Winery will host the Vintage North Jersey Wine and Food Festival, where vintners from along the budding New Jersey Wine Trail will assemble to holding wine tastings and serving accompanying food. On Matarazzo's menu? Homemade flatbread pizza!
Free Range Livestock
Although the classic image of cows grazing lazily, chickens pecking the ground at their feet and pigs rooting around the barnyard on Grandma's farm is long gone from the commercial landscape, some New Jersey family farms raise and sell meats for local customers.
Grains and Grapes
There is something about visiting the beautiful countryside of Warren County, New Jersey, that makes you want to slow down and soak in all the history and natural beauty that surrounds you on your journey. What better way to enjoy these characteristics than to savor them over a glass of local wine or a pint of handcrafted beer?
Hard Rain's Gonna Fall
People who tend the land have observed physical weather-related changes that affect their occupations. Some had to rethink their direction while others continue on, hoping for the best, but onward thinkers all. Here are a few of their experiences.
History You Can Taste
The Garden State Heirloom Seed Society Museum, housed in a nineteenth century farm house, is an interactive and informative stroll through New Jersey?s storied agricultural past.
If You Plant It, Will They Come?
Insects are critical components of any natural area. Gardeners have become increasingly aware that, if we want wildlife in our gardens, we must support all life stages, year 'round. With the fragmented state of our natural areas, wildlife relies on our gardens, yards, fields, hedgerows, and woodlots to survive. When using native plants in a landscape, we are attempting to recreate functioning ecosystems to support the wonderful wildlife that, in fact, needs us to survive.
Jersey Grown Gardens
If toxic chemicals don't fit your vision of "green thumbness," look to the following alternatives for making your lawn and garden come alive!
Jersey Tomato Tasting
Some say that the Jersey tomato is just a memory; a juicy legend from times gone by, when tomatoes weren't born to run across the country in tractor-trailers.
Orchard View Lavender Farm
Orchard View Lavender Farm is the latest chapter in the story told by ten acres of land along Karrsville Road in Port Murray.
Orchards
Much of the terrain in the northwestern section tends to be rocky and hilly, suited more for planting fruit trees than for field crop production.
Organic Farming
Because these farmers don't rely on chemical fertilizers and pesticides to protect their plants, they rely on the land and treat it with respect. Some sell at market, others sell from a stand. Some share their bounty along with the risk of poor years with farm co-op members.
Partners Du Jour
There is no formal definition for a 'farm-to-table" menu, but diners usually expect that so-described selections are prepared with locally sourced ingredients supplied directly by farmers who have raised their crops or livestock without the use of pesticides or hormones. Is this just another exclusive food fad, or can it be part of a social movement towards a sustainable local economy in Northwest New Jersey?
Race Farm: A Taste of Summer
The Race family sticks to a rapid pace and a complicated schedule: tending to the trees and produce, participating in multiple farmers' markets, planning events, and making foods and baked goods for the roadside market. Try their blueberry lemonade!
Risky Business: Bringing in the Hemp
In August, 2019, the New Jersey Hemp Farming Act became law under the New Jersey Department of Agriculture (NJDA). Only those who pass the screening process, criminal background checks and fingerprinting can apply to obtain a license. And there must also be a particular appetite for risk in order to bring in New Jersey's first industrial hemp crop.
Shear Delight
Jacobs are the sheep of choice at Jenny Jump Farm. Hand-spinners love their natural color, and the wool can be spun into a complete spectrum from white to black.
Tassot Apiaries
Jean-Claude and his team are celebrating their 10th anniversary as your experts in beeswax candles, natural soaps and cosmetics, bee pollen, beekeeping equipment and of course…HONEY.
Victory Veggies. Grow a Survival Garden!
Today it seems we're in a war against old habits. Our excesses may be catching up with us. There's a blight spreading through the money tree in America. Is it dead or just dormant? Will it bloom this year or skip a year, or even more? We keep hearing that the housing bubble has burst and we're in a stock market correction. Maybe it is time for an agricultural correction.
Warren County Farmers Fair
The history of the Warren County Farmers' Fair is a checkered one. The event that we know today -- an agriculturally based, family oriented exposition -- was a long time in coming. It almost didn't make it.
Well-Sweep Herb Farm
Touring Well-Sweep Herb Farm in Port Murray is an exciting learning experience; part herbal lesson, part horticulture history flashback, part taste test.
White Township Farms: The End Of An Era
An interesting book about farms in White Township, reminds us of the farmer's ingenuity, and of the values represented by the Warren County's agricultural heritage.
Windy Brow Farm: A Taste of Summer
Pick up some yellow peaches at Windy Brow then try one of their favorite seasonal recipes, Grilled Peach Summer Salad.
Women in New Jersey Agriculture
Women make up twenty-two percent of New Jersey's 15,936-plus farmers, and their rate is steadily increasing. They come with ideals and energy to make the world a better place. They earn a living being outdoors doing what they love, and they come to educate. They all come with grit, knowledge and spirit.
Yardology
Your backyard can be more than just an area you need to mow on Saturdays. Even on a small lot in a congested suburban area, you can grow enough food to put away dozens of quarts of delicious homegrown produce for consumption throughout the year. And it is fascinating to take note of the wide variety of wildlife with which you share your domain. You may even want to invite more!
Your Neighbor's Cow
Northwest New Jersey is now home to two dairy farmers who sell their milk directly to the consumer. It may not seem like much, but it is an important step forward in developing a more direct relationship between food and farm. Or is it an important step back, to days when food didn?t come from the supermarket shelves?
Along the Vintage North Jersey Trail
A portion of the western part of Warren County, along the Delaware and Musconetcong rivers and their tributaries, has been designated by the federal government as a wine grape-growing region. Take a leisurely ride from one Warren County winery to another and find out what happens with those grapes!
Brook Hollow Winery
The Brook Hollow Winery, in Knowlton Township, looks out over a five-acre vineyard, then beyond to the Delaware Water Gap.
Dirty Little Secrets
Want in on a dirty little secret? "Holy cow, it's in the dirt." Yep, good old Garden State dirt. No, not our usual tabloid kind rife with political scandals, but the stuff beneath your feet. As any farmer and every gardener will attest, it's the stuff dreams are made of. And even if you don't have a green thumb, you'll know its hue, color and timbre, how it compacts and crumbles between your fingers, how its savory aroma wafts up as you bend forward for a whiff, and how nearly you can taste it.
Grains and Grapes
There is something about visiting the beautiful countryside of Warren County, New Jersey, that makes you want to slow down and soak in all the history and natural beauty that surrounds you on your journey. What better way to enjoy these characteristics than to savor them over a glass of local wine or a pint of handcrafted beer?
Apple Picking
A walk among ageless trees laden with the mythical fruit is a trip through a special kind of garden.
Berry Picking
Beginning with the strawberries and languishing until the frosts of October, berries provide a lengthy time span for berry-lovers in the Skylands region to get out and savor the juicy goodness of a native fruit.
Orchards
Much of the terrain in the northwestern section tends to be rocky and hilly, suited more for planting fruit trees than for field crop production.
PYO Farms and Markets
Farm Preservation
Farmland Preservation is completely voluntary, and there are a variety of programs available to assist farmers to maintain their property in functional agriculture.
Hunterdon County Farm Visits
They are as different from each other as three farmers can be and as different from a non-farmer's stereotype of farmers as they can be. But they have this in common: They love their work, and their work is never-ending. Talk to any of them for long, and you find out that when a farmer is awake, he's at work.