Willow Creek Farm Preserve

Willow Creek Farm Preserve is a Certified Organic farm and Benefit LLC that connects people and nature to empower and strengthen the well-being of our community. We are passionate about people and raising Shetland Sheep and believe we can create connection and wellness for ourselves and the environment through fiber farming.

Our 135-acre property has a rich history, having been inhabited by indigenous peoples, including the Lenape Native Americans, and has been continuously farmed since 1754. Our land has been permanently preserved through an agricultural conservation easement ensuring its use for agriculture into perpetuity…we love farming!

The path to creating Willow Creek Farm Preserve (WCFP) began in 2002, with a dream of establishing an organic orchard and inviting the community to pick-your-own and shop at a retail farm market…This was our former business, Willow Creek Orchards. It was a business about us…about our family, about what we could accomplish, and it was a business that wasn’t very…fruitful. The trees never produced even close to our projected yields, we were unable to be profitable, and although we gained countless friends and dedicated staff along the way, we decided to close up shop, leased the farm, and in 2011 packed up and moved on.

WCFP is built on the foundation of these trials, failures, and learning. In 2018, we returned to the farm to begin the process of transitioning our land back to Certified Organic status. During our hiatus, our family started raising Shetland Sheep for wool and over the past five years since founding WCFP, through the Covid-19 pandemic and more challenges, we are leaning into growing our herd of sheep even further. We have added new pastures, reduced even further our small fruit production (only limited wholesale Certified Organic Blueberries & Blackberries will be offered). In 2023 and beyond we will be open in the Spring only for the community to meet our newest lamb crew and to enjoy our specialty Spring Flowers.  We are more dedicated than ever to steward this land for others in order to share our farm for purpose-driven initiatives…We hope to see you out on the farm soon!

 – Melissa & Drew Smith