Established in 2005, Buffalo Creek Berry Farm began as a vision of fresh fruit grown in a peaceful location for everyone to enjoy.
The land was previously a pine forest, part of the great Lanier holdings. Robert & Martha Daniel at retirement age had a desire to return to rural life and the farm. They purchased land that had not been farmed in more than 50 years which had been turned into a pine tree farm. They reclaimed a portion to begin the 23 acre farm. After working through several problems and weather delays, they opened in June 2009. They had a great response and enjoyed meeting many people from Oglethorpe and surrounding counties. They found that people were truly hungry for good healthy food products, and since this was the initial dream, the farm has succeeded.
In 2017 husband-wife team Cameron Phillips and Laura Pallas continued this dream.
Dr Laura was born and raised in nearby Madison County and studied engineering at UGA (undergrad), food science at UCDavis (MS), and food science at UGA (PhD). Laura’s PhD project focused on quality and sensory aspects of drying Georgia blueberries. For nearly 8 years, Laura lived in Australia, working in the food industry developing gluten-free breakfast cereals and snacks along with rice variety research. Cameron was born and raised on farms in Australia where the family started out in conventional farming and moved to Demeter bio-dynamic farming in 1991 due to family sickness from commercial sprays. Cameron studied agriculture, was a contract harvester for many years and then studied Exercise Physiology & Nutrition in the early 2000’s. He returned to the family farm in 2009 to help out his parents with their venture in pomegranates. In 2014, Laura and Cameron met at Cameron’s family pomegranate farm in Victoria, Australia; they married in 2015; their daughter Elsie was born in Dec 2016; in October 2017 they moved to Georgia to be near Laura’s parents and continue their dream of growing and creating healthy foods; a second daughter, Savannah, was born in October 2018 and that same month Laura’s father passed; the farm achieved Certified Naturally Grown status in January 2019 and shifted towards focus on farmers markets.
Our goal is to grow our products as naturally as possible without synthetic pesticides and herbicides, and we have been able to that with our Berries, veggies and herbs.
We never spray our berries. We use OMRI approved organic soil and plant amendments, worm castings and state of the art leaf tissue analysis to better understand potential deficiencies and where to focus plant nutrition. We are Certified Naturally Grown and aim to become certified Organic by 2025 and ultimately Demeter bio-dynamic by focusing on natural inputs, soil biology, and whole farm integration. Our commitment also is to offer these products at an affordable price to our customers, yet remembering we must cover farm costs.
We are excited to be developing our plans for future fruit expansion and even developing our own juice range!
Check out what we are growing on our U Pick page . Laura and Cameron will also continue to host fermented vegetable (sauerkraut, brined vegetables, and kimchi) workshops and Kombucha (fermented probiotic tea) workshops which they previously hosted in Australia. Look for workshop dates on our Events page.
We are proud of our farm, work constantly to improve every aspect of it, and hope you will enjoy our efforts.
We have ample room for you to stay awhile, stroll around the orchard, and meet friends and neighbors.
Bring your entire family so they can learn that not all food comes from the grocery store and can see the beauty of farming as well.
With 2500 blueberry bushes, there’s plenty to be picked.
In winter 2006, the first 1180 blueberries (Premier, Tifblue, Brightwell and Climax) were planted followed by another 495 blueberries of two different cultivars (Powderblue and Ochlockonee) in winter 2009 to have more berries through the season. The feedback on the blueberries was so positive and encouraging that more blueberries were needed to meet demand. This inspired an additional planting of 665 blueberries (Titan, Alapaha, Ochlockonee, and Baldwin) in winter 2014. Six months later (May 2015), another 160 Titan blueberries were added due to their large berry size. All our varieties are Rabbiteye blueberries.
While late frosts have often affected the production of blueberries, our blackberries have always produced (until we experienced a total frost wipeout in late April 2021).
We grow both thornless and thorny blackberries. We prefer the flavor of the blackberries with thorns and believe they are well worth the care of picking. That being noted, we have 2 thornless varieties, Arapaho and Quachita, which are both excellent blackberries for cooking and fresh eating. Our planting of blackberries began in summer 2012 and continued each year through spring 2015.
We had about 2000 blackberry plants until summer 2022 when we decided to replant a field of blackberries with blueberries as the soil tested there was the most acidic (about 5.6). This reduced our blackberry planting to about 750 plants. We are in the midst of a major farm replant including 1000 blueberries, 1000 blackberries and possibly a few new fruits that may not be affected by late Spring frosts. The replant will finish in winter 2023-2024 and thus we are planting for the future. Berries require patience and a lot of love to enjoy their fruits.
We have over 40 mulberry trees in three locations on the farm.
If you have not yet experienced a mulberry, you are in for a treat! Mulberries are like blackberries without the seeds and more intense sweet flavor. They make excellent wine, juice, pies, fresh eating and pretty well fit into any berry recipe. We invite you to experience these berries for yourself. In Fall 2019 we planted an additional 24 mulberry tree to compliment our mature 17 trees to meet the demand for these jewels at market.
Elderberries are known for their high antioxidant and Vitamin C contents.
We planted 12 elderberry cuttings in winter 2017 and look forward to harvesting their fruit in late summer 2020. Birds enjoyed our 2019 production so we aim to net the plants in 2020. In 2021 we planted more elderberries on blackberry hill and these produce well. Timing is everything when it comes to harvest and competing with the birds.
Muscadines are a favorite for wine and juice.
We have chosen a black variety that will make excellent juice, jelly and/or wine. Plus the black varieties have more antioxidants and are absolutely delicious in our opinion. These plants are growing a bit slower than anticipated due to drought in 2019 so look for these to be available most likely in late summer 2021.
The most exciting planting we have made is our variety trial of pomegranates.
Pomegranates are not an established fruit grown in Georgia although several varieties are showing promise around the state. Since our Demeter biodynamic small family farm in Australia grows pomegranates, we were keen to try growing this amazing and special fruit here in Georgia. There are 16 varieties of at least 10 trees planted March 2018 plus another 6 varieties of smaller quantity. The arils (seeds) will range from dark purple to white and flavour from sweet-tart to tangerine. We are very excited to see the fruit produced by these varieties. Due to our cold winters (compared to California), sometimes late spring frosts, and relatively high humidity, some varieties may prove unsuitable. We vow to never apply fungicides to our fruit. This is the chance we take to offer you a variety of amazing, healthy fruit. After Fall 2019, the Parfianka variety is showing the most promise for surviving our winters and variable spring temperatures. In 2023 it is not looking very promising for our venture into pomegranates. The trees receive a hiding every Spring with their leaves burned multiple times by frost.
