Pennsylvania is tops in the nation in preserving farmland, and Berks County plays a large role in that. During a recent presentation to the county commissioners, the executive director of the Berks County Department of Agriculture said 822 farms, totaling more than 78,500 acres, have been permanently preserved in Berks through the State Bureau of Farmland Preservation, according to a report in the Reading Eagle.
Not only do the county’s farms play an invaluable role in our food supply, some also offer fun family activities like tours, mobile petting zoos and goat yoga. Here are three to check out.
Americana Farm LLC Apiary: A Hive Mind
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Old MacDonald had a farm, E-I-E-I-O. And on that farm, he had some … bees?
They might not be what you’d expect to find, but the honey makers are the bees’ knees at Americana Farm LLC Apiary in Shoemakersville.
“A lot of people don't consider beekeeping farming,” says Kim Brown, who has run the business with husband, David, since 2015. “But beekeeping is farming; a bee is livestock and honey is the product, just like beef is from a cow.”
An avid gardener, Kim decided to get involved with the insects due to their ever-important role as pollinators. The couple spent a few growing seasons informally beekeeping; then, seeing the kind of money that went into the operation, they decided to turn it into a business.
Americana Farm hosts 15 colonies, each containing anywhere from 10,000 to 60,000 bees producing wildflower honey, according to the owners, who received two first-place ribbons at the 2023 Kutztown Fair for their light and medium varieties. They also produce a popular Carolina Reaper-infused hot honey.
“We tried three different layers of hot, and it turned out that the hottest one was the best,” David says.
Its jars of honey and honey candies can be personalized for weddings, holidays and other notable events. But honey is far from the only product at Americana, which also offers beeswax candles, lip balms, party favors and artisan soaps made from honey and goat's milk.
“The honey is added for extra moisturizer in the soap,” David says. “We get a lot of good reviews about how mild the soap is.”
The brightly colored offerings feature scents such as lavender, lemon, mint and eucalyptus.
The beeswax candles come in various shapes, including the Millennium Falcon and the Death Star from the Star Wars universe, an owl, a gnome, the Philadelphia Love sign and, naturally, a honeycomb.
Americana Farm’s owners even offer speaking engagements, with topics such as A Year in the Life of a Beekeeper and Her Bees, Pollinator Gardening and How is Honey Made?
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A retail room offering its products is open a few days a week, and the owners maintain a stand at Leesport Farmers Market every Wednesday, weather permitting. Its products are also offered at ACEC Farm Market in Shoemakersville, Lazy Dog Vintage in Hamburg and Carey and Schnalzer Quality Meats in New Tripoli.
Americana doesn’t give official tours of the hives — that idea was frowned upon by its insurance company — but visitors can view them from a distance.
Nearing retirement from his day job, David hopes to put more time into the business, potentially offering more events throughout the year, allowing Americana Farm to continue bringing its A-game with bees.
His wife offers similar sentiments. “Hopefully, we’ll still be beekeeping,” Kim says about the owners’ future. “And our hives will still be thriving.”
Bent Limb Farm LLC: A Fruitful Midlife Shift
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A life coaching session might not seem like the kind of thing to spur a transition from the medical field to owning four dozen alpacas, but that’s precisely what happened with Pamela Ellenberger.
A plastic surgeon for most of her professional life, Ellenberger founded Berks Plastic Surgery in Wyomissing, which she has since sold. But a conversation with a life coach 15 years ago in Montreal convinced her that, in her early 50s, it was time to move on.
“And then my husband’s like, ‘Well, what are you going to do?’” she recalls. “I knit and I love yarn. I love fiber. And that’s how we started with alpacas.”
The Ellenbergers bought property in Shoemakersville in 2010 and moved there a year later. Over the years they’ve amassed quite a stable of animal mates. Along with the alpacas, there are 120 laying hens, 30 goats, 15 angora rabbits, 15 sheep, 10 breeding pigs, two geese and two llamas … but no partridge in a pear tree.
The animals are available for purchase, as is their meat. Licensed through the Department of Agriculture, Bent Limb sells chicken, turkey, pork, goat and lamb along with eggs and bone broth. An overarching philosophy driving the farm is “waste not, want not.”
“We try to use as much of the animal as possible,” she says. “When I take a pig to the butcher, we get almost everything back and try to use it. We get the fat and we get the meat and the bones, and I make bone broth.”
Ellenberger also subscribes to the belief of animal behaviorist Temple Grandin, who posited that if humans are going to raise animals for meat, they should be raised humanely and killed as humanely as possible. At Bent Limb, pigs and chickens roam around outside, protected from predators by physical and electric fencing.
“It takes more work,” she says. “It's easier to just have them in a building. But they're healthier outside. Every animal on the farm has a purpose, and we try to use the animals for what they normally would like to do anyhow. And by moving the animals across the property, we've improved the property.
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Our soil tests show that we have more organic matter in our soil than when we started. We use non-genetically modified feed to keep the chemicals down. That costs more, but I think it keeps my animals healthier.”
In terms of fiber, Bent Limb has products for all stages of the creation process. There’s alpaca and angora fiber and spinning wheels for those who want to create, and sweaters, gloves, mittens and other products for those who want to purchase finished works. The farm’s products can be bought on its website as well as on-site, where tours are also offered, often of the selfguided variety.
Ellenberger says she’s hoping to continue with the farm for at least another decade.
“I'm happy with where our numbers are as far as our animals go,” she says. “I don't think our land can handle much more. So it's a matter of building our customer base. That's one thing I want to do for the future, continuing to get more people who are interested in better quality meat for their families.”
Swartz Farm : Forward, and Backward, Looking
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The fourth generation to farm his family’s land in Mohnton, Dennis Swartz is working to restore its past while also adapting to ensure its future.
Started by Swartz’s great-grandparents, Swartz’s Roadside Stand (now Swartz Farm) initially focused on livestock. Subsequent generations vacillated between animals and produce. Swartz offers a bit of both: chicken, duck and goose eggs; various kinds of produce; and turkeys for Thanksgiving. All its products are sold on the farm, where it avoids genetically modified ingredients in its feed and chemical sprays and fertilizers on its crops.
“We have a lot of customers tell us once they've had the free-range eggs, they won't go back to the store-bought,” Swartz says.
But the farm’s focus has become agritourism.
That includes baby goat yoga, farm tours, birthday parties on the farm, a rent-a-chick program, animal walks and a mobile petting zoo.
“It’s geared toward educating the public, having them come out and see the animals and learning about what it takes to take care of them,” Swartz says.
Started on a lark after buying some goats to help clear out his grandparents’ former property, baby goat yoga has become so popular that people message Swartz during the offseason, asking when it’s going to start again. (It runs from May through the fall.)
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Also in demand is the rent-a-chick program, which allows families to experience raising chicks without having to commit. The farm provides everything baby chicks need for their first two weeks of life. After those two weeks are up, the family decides if it wants to keep them or return them. Returned chicks are then raised to be egg-layers.
“We’ve had a lot of local schools do it; we've had nursing homes do it,” he says. “And a lot of people in Berks and Lancaster nursing homes grew up on farms. So it's neat for them to relive raising the chicks again.”
Started last year, the mobile petting zoo has allowed the farm to take its animals everywhere, from birthday parties to nursing homes, even the Kutztown Folk Fest.
“It's really kind of allowed us to go off the farm,” he says. “And in return, it brings people back to the farm.”
Available by appointment, Swartz Farm also offers private tours and animal walks with sheep, alpacas, mini cows or mini horses. If you don’t feel like a stroll, you can purchase cuddle sessions with mini cows and baby goats.
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The farm puts much of the money made through agritourism back into the farmland, which is a good thing due to the high cost of fencing in pastures. Swartz says a neighbor helps quite a bit around the farm, but otherwise, it’s a family affair. And Swartz is paying homage to prior generations with some renovations across the street.
After his grandparents passed away, he purchased their home and decided to return it to its early-20th-century appearance, bringing it back to a pasture setting, putting up a fence and bringing a spring-fed pond back to life.
“A lot of people kind of forgot about it or didn't know it existed,” Swartz says. “It’s kind of cool that there are still families that grew up around my grandparents’ time who say they like that we’re bringing the property back to working form again.”
Sources
Americana Farm LLC
78 Berk Rd., Shoemakersville | 610.916.1433 | start.americanafarm.com/
Bent Limb Farm LLC
592 Stone Hill Rd., Shoemakersville | 484.797.2263 | bentlimbfarm.com
Swartz Farm
1641 Alleghenyville Rd., Mohnton | 610.790.5339 | swartzroadsidestand.com
