At Creekbottom Farm, we are constantly growing and evolving and learning. Our primary mission is to grow enough wholesome, organic food to feed our family with a little extra to sell. We raise a small number of animals and provide ample space for them to range, socialize, and express their true natures. Chickens know how to be chickens from the time they are tiny chicks without anyone having to teach them. It is pure joy to watch them hatch out of their eggs and start hunting and pecking and hopping around. Our hens enjoy free range of almost the entire property and spend the majority of their time outside before tucking themselves in at sundown. Their eggs are delicious and beautiful, and more nutritionally dense due to their foraging activities.

Over the years that we’ve lived on our farm, we have tried so many new things. Some things work beautifully, and others end up as failed experiments. I’ve found some favourite chicken breeds, and I love that their eggs come in every colour of the rainbow. We enjoyed fresh milk from Nubian goats for several years before tiring of the milking, and now we have a handful of a small and thrifty breed of sheep called Southdown Babydoll. They graze the pastures and keep them neatly trimmed, and they also provide us with beautiful cashmere-like fibre that we get turned into beautiful yarn. They have lovely, calm temperaments and permanent smiles on their cute, fully-wooled faces. This year I’m raising Black Spanish turkeys, and I plan to keep a breeding group of this unique variety, now on the threatened list. This breed doesn’t grow as quickly as commercial turkeys, but they have extremely good foraging abilities and produce a premium grade of meat with much deeper flavour profile. They retain more of the “wild” turkey traits, allowing them to have excellent survival instincts and mothering abilities.

Over the years our landscape has evolved and matured, thanks to the incredible dedication, vision and hard work that Jess has contributed. We now look forward each year to plump peaches, juicy apples, a bounty of berries of all sorts, figs, plums, cherries and kiwis. And our vegetable gardening improves and scales up with every passing summer season as well, as we install additional raised beds and add more garden space. We have a greenhouse now too, which allows us to enjoy fresh greens year round, and an amazing crop of tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, melons and herbs in the summer.

Spring is a magical time on the farm, so much life bursting forth from the soil, from the eggs beneath the broody hens, and from the mama sheep at lambing time. The summers are hot and dry, stressful in some ways because of the amount of irrigation required. Fall arrives as a welcome comfort, marking the end of the hot and dry season and the beginning of a slower time for the gardening activities. The rhythm of the seasons has taken on a new significance for us on the farm, and this place is my bliss and my home, my little slice of paradise.