A Bi-Monthly Magazine
Borrowing From Yesterday To Do the Work Of Today
Offering Resources to Promote Self-Sufficient & Back-to-the-Land Living
Media, Pennsylvania USA
Barbara Corson
The Colonial Pennsylvania
Plantation
Ridley Creek State Park
Media, PA 19063
phone:717-576-0887
email:
hooftales@msn.com website:www.colonialplantation.org
Colonial PA Plantation
The Colonial Pa Plantation (CPP) is a non-profit historic farm located within Ridley Creek State Park about 15 miles from Philadelphia. Our mission is to educate the public about everyday farm life in 18th century Pennsylvania. The site consists of several buildings original to the 1700s, and additional recreated buildings on approximately 100 acres of land bordering the Ridley Creek. Our farm animals including horses and cattle serve several purposes: 1) they provide power for the work of farming and logging; 2) they provide other products like manure, wool, milk, and meat; and 3) they educate our visitors and staff about history and sustainable agriculture.
Overview
- Source of power: 2 draft horses, 3 oxen
- Animals are used to: All our current draft animals are young and learning to do various field work including dragging manure-sleds, logs, and harrows, pulling carts, and plowing.
- Other livestock: one milking cow, sheep, pigs, poultry, cats and dogs
- Acreage: 1 in garden, 20 in pasture,1 in hay, 20 woodlot, other in wetlands.
- Skills offered in: The current farmer is a (retired) veterinarian with more than 25 years experience with working horses and cattle (oxen and milk cows).
- Work hours: variable
- Apprenticeship: We desire an apprentice/ intern primarily for the summer months of May through mid-September. The apprentice will be introduced to all the animals and crops but actual tasks will be determined based on the apprentice's aptitude and interest. Tasks may include grooming, harnessing and driving horses and oxen, milking the cow, leading animals to pasture, cleaning stalls, as well as gardening and field work. Opportunity exists to experience other pre-petroleum skills, e.g., carpentry, spinning and weaving with wool and flax, hearth cooking, blacksmithing, beekeeping etc.
- Expectations: interested in historic agriculture and sustainable living; cheerful and conscientious.
- Apprentice must: be over 18, no alcohol or drug use allowed on site. You must have health insurance . We expect you to be pleasant, honest and interested in learning and in sharing what you already know.
- Stipend: none
- Accommodations: possibility for housing exists depending on apprentice needs
- Meals: some meals available if desired
- Visit first: yes
- Trial period: none
