Sustainable Saturday Spring at the Frog Pond

No, today's post is not about a pond that frogs live in, as much as I love the sound of spring peepers.

One of the things I enjoy about living in the Binghamton, New York area is that you aren't all that far (by car) from beautiful rural scenery and various farms.  Please come along with me on a little local adventure.

In late April, I traveled from Harpursville, New York (home of Animal Adventure Park, where a webcam trained on a pregnant giraffe named April went viral during the winter) about 15 miles to Bainbridge, New York.  There are two places near Bainbridge I will go to:  Pine Ridge Grocery, an Amish-style bulk grocery which is a wonderful adventure in grocery shopping, and Frog Pond Farms.

(If you are in the area next Saturday, Pine Ridge is having its annual Customer Appreciation Day, and you will have a good time there.)

Frog Pond can be extremely crowded (I don't recommend going there on weekends) but it can be a fun place for a family outing.  There are farm animals (if you are into that), lots of produce, and the best part - you can eat any fresh produce they sell, as long as you eat it on the premises.  So, if your child is hungry, you can head towards some fruit, and it is fine with the owners.

The greenhouse was full of early spring plants

So if you see some strawberries, for example, you can sample before you buy.  The day I was there, I did just that (and, I bought some delicious strawberries from North Carolina. Ours won't be ready for another month).

Local Maple Products

I will caution you - the produce is not always local, especially in the springtime, and you have to be careful about what you buy.  But there also some incredible bargains to be had.

There's one more attraction - the owner, who checks you out in an auctioneer-like sing song, totalling up your purchase entirely in his head.  I should have recorded him.

If you plan to visit this part of upstate New York to see April the Giraffe, this is only about a 15 or so minute drive from the Harpursville area.

Here are some more posts about Frog Pond:
The Mental Math auctioneer
The Chia Plant
Fall at Frog Pond

If you are planning to visit April the Giraffe and are interested in any other attractions around Binghamton, New York, please mention it in the comments and I'll see what I can do.