Buffalo Creek Berry Farm

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 (Ph D). Laura’s Ph D 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