This summer we did the thing we’d been talking about since we bought this place: we opened the gates and let the kids in. About ten of them — give or take a toddler and the occasional extra parent or friend — for five hours a day, all week. We’re calling it the first annual Wild Roots Camp — and yes, we said “annual” out loud before the first day was even over, because that’s how sure we were by lunchtime.
What camp looked like.
Every day, the campers came down the gravel road with more energy than the entire farm produces in a week. We would love to tell you they left as junior regenerative farmers. Honestly? Over five hours a day they learned a bit about the farm, did a bit of work on the land, and had an enormous amount of fun, in roughly that order of effort. That’s what camp is for.
The animals had opinions.
The animals, meanwhile, had the best week of their lives. Bowser took one look at a crowd of small humans with snack potential and decided camp was the greatest idea this farm has ever had. Nutella and Slurpee, the escape artists, took every opportunity to sneak up on the campers. The Golden Girls supervised from a judgmental distance, with Dorothy conducting what we can only describe as daily safety inspections. It wouldn’t be a farm without them.
The fort and the weeding wars.
At some point, camp split into two great engineering projects. The boys disappeared into the woods and built a fort — planned it, gathered for it, argued about it the appropriate amount, and built it. It is sturdy. It is hidden. It is, structurally speaking, better than at least two things we have personally built on this property. The fort stays. The fort is now part of the farm.
The girls, meanwhile, took on a weeding competition — in the heat, in the sun, in beds that had gotten well ahead of us. Were they having the time of their lives? No. Was there visible relief when it ended? Yes. But those beds have never been so thoroughly, so ruthlessly weeded, and the girls earned every bit of the shade and the bragging rights that followed.
Simple syrup, personalized.
One of the quiet hits of the week: the campers gathered herbs from around the farm and each made their own personalized simple syrup — picked it, made it, bottled it, took it home. Ten kids, ten completely different syrups, ten very confident opinions about whose was best. We consider this the farm’s first product line.
The Wild Roots Olympics.
Midweek, camp escalated into the first Wild Roots Olympics: tug-of-war, heavy lifting, goal scoring, and competitive wheelbarrow pushing. Andrew made the Olympics the big day, and ran the entire thing like it was the real Olympics. The kids pulled, lifted, scored, and pushed with a ferocity that suggests the future of farming is in very strong hands.
“How hard could ten kids be?”— Famous last words, again, Wild Roots HQ, summer 2026
The people who made it happen.
Camp ran because Karl and Larry, the best camp counselors, ran it — all week, all energy, all in. One camper’s big sister was there helping wherever help was needed — she was, in a word, awesome, and camp doesn’t happen without her. And Kappie and Joe, of course, did what Kappie and Joe do: kept the farm running around all of it and made every long day a fun one. Everyone went home tired, muddy, and asking to come back. We couldn’t be happier.
✎ See you next summer. The fort will be waiting. — Snoopy and Fam