Family Farm Adventures
Ages
All ages
Participants
Family units, immediate households, or small pods
<10 total. For larger groups, please contact us to coordinate your visit
Price
$170
Sliding scale available
Get outdoors and connect in nature
Family Farm Adventures bring you to the magic of the great outdoors at Oxbow, providing a fun, family outing. During this visit, your family will build connections with each other and the ecosystem in a safe and meaningful way—bringing science, farming, and sustainability topics to life and creating lifelong advocates of the Earth.
Oxbow’s magical, kid-friendly farm and garden spaces set the stage to inspire our future land stewards, scientists, farmers, and healthy eaters.
What to expect
Your and your family will get hands-on as you explore interdependent natural relationships, plant & animal needs, decomposition, and the life cycles of the food crops we love.
Your experience can be filled with open-ended exploration and play, farmer-guided activity stations, or a combination of both! Here are some examples of the types of things you’ll do.
- Explore seasonal farm phenomena while learning about the season’s bounties
- Engage with plants and their 6 main parts while studying their structure and function as Living Systems
- Identify helpers and pests on a farm, and visit our decomposers to see nutrient cycling in action at our worm bin/compost station.
- Eat farm-fresh harvests and share the love of fruits & veggies with your little ones.
- Connect with nature in a safe, kid-friendly setting.
- Enjoy the taste, smell, experience, and views Oxbow has for you.
As your family explores our grounds, we welcome input on what your family unit might be curious about learning. We work with parents to meet differing needs and interests across participant ages, learning challenges, interests, and physical abilities.
Click the seasons below to picture your Family Farm Adventure throughout the year
Oxbow is BURSTING with greenery and new life during the springtime! On a Spring Farm Adventure at Oxbow, you might…
- Search for signs of spring and nibble on some fresh produce from the field
- Visit the Oxbow Orchard and look for native pollinators hard at work
- Explore the Worm Tower and Kids’ Farm Compost bays to learn how gentle decomposers help us grow delicious food
- Plant a sunflower seed and take one home with you in a newspaper pot you’ll make yourself
- Birdwatch as we try to spy our avian neighbors during spring migration, and search for evidence of other animal friends in the fields
Or… you could hunt for the season’s earliest strawberry blossoms, help our farmers transplant new seedlings into a row, plant a special heirloom seed around our Bean Arena, and so much more!
Spring Family Farm Adventures are offered April through early June.
On a curiosity-driven adventure through the farm fields, kids will discover the small but crucial critters that help our plants grow and explore the bounties of the summer season. In this plentiful season we’ll taste & compare well known foods, including ripe berries, witness wildlife, and even get a glimpse into the hard work farmers do on an organic farm, controlling weeds and pests!
- Embody pollinators, visiting the flowers in the squash or “cucurbits” rows and carry pollen from one flower to the next
- Learn about how water is a precious resource in the summer and care for the plants in our raised bed
- Play games, sings songs, and more!
Summer Family Farm Adventures are offered late June through early September.
As sunflowers fade and our farmers’ attention shifts to the autumn harvest, there’s magic to be found all around Oxbow’s farm fields and forests. During a Fall Family Farm Adventure, you might…
- Harvest and snack on all six plant parts– roots, stems, leaves, flowers, and fruits and learn about their function.
- Learn to save seeds in the vine tunnels and examine the veins of changing leaves on our Lightboard
- Look for signs of fall wildlife and learn about what animals might be doing during this time of the year
Fall Family Farm Adventures are offered from mid-September through mid-November.
Registration
Available time slots
Weekdays starting in April
9:00-11 AM | 12:00-2 PM | 3:00-5 PM
Cost
$170 per visit
Sliding scale available
No one will be turned away. Our Sliding Scale reflects Oxbow’s mission to make programming as accessible as possible for all. If you need financial support, we can provide it; if you can contribute to other’s family’s possibility of attending you can donate and help us extend our mission. Please contact us if you have any questions or comments.
FAQs
The health and safety of our guests and staff are Oxbow’s top priorities. See our detailed Family Farm Adventure FAQ page to learn about safety guidelines and the ins & outs of your visit, along with other frequently asked questions.