By: Emily Wheeler, Winter Term Residential Life Coordinator

As the season winds down, what better time to go visit a farm? The Full and Gold Term athletes took a short detour on the way home from the mountain last week to stop in at the North Country School (NCS), a neat boarding school for grades 4-9 just down the road from us in Lake Placid.

Since its inception, NCS has incorporated farming into its school practices and curriculum. Joining forces with the Edible Schoolyard Project, a national program out of Berkeley, California, NCS has become a leader in the Farm-to-School movement.

The Adirondacks have a very short growing season, so you might think that there wouldn’t be much happening on the farm in late-March – au contraire! The school is quite busy boiling maple sap, starting vegetable seeds in their greenhouse, and welcoming lots of new baby animals to their barn! NCS Farm Manager, Katie Culpepper, took a break from work to show us around.

Coach Piet and athlete Ben Taber visit with a pregnant goat

 

Magnus and Emma hold 4-day old chicks as Coach Piet SnapChats the excitement

 

Ben and Inez show the group the technique for catching chickens

 

The group catches on quickly with these surprisingly docile hens