Physical Address: 2121 Larger Cross Rd, Bedminster, NJ 07921
Directions: Link to Directions
Operating Hours and Seasons: Dawn to dusk, year-round.
November – February: Fairview Farm has a deer management program established as part of its long-term stewardship goals. Deer management is crucial to the establishment of native vegetation and in the fight against invasive plants. Fairview Farm’s deer management program strictly follows NJ State Hunting regulations.
Fees: Raritan Headwaters does not charge a fee to visit our properties. But maintaining and improving nature preserves is expensive, so we welcome donations to help defray our stewardship costs. Thank you for helping our preserves!
DONATE | VOLUNTEER
Fairview Farm serves as the main headquarters for our staff, with offices located in two converted houses – a white clapboard farmhouse and a red brick cottage. The campus itself is a hidden treasure, reached by driving through a pair of rustic stone gates off rural Larger Cross Road and proceeding down a half-mile driveway before crossing a small bridge over a stream.
The buildings and 150 acres of surrounding land, a former dairy farm, were donated to the Upper Raritan Watershed Association in 1973 by Roberta Zuhlke. Raritan Headwaters operates Fairview Farm campus as a model of environmental stewardship, with our office staff recycling and composting as much as possible to reduce our impact on the land.
The farmhouse houses our administrative staff, as well as the policy, development, and land projects departments. The farmhouse kitchen remains, but the parlor and bedrooms have been converted to offices and the former dining room is now a meeting room. The brick cottage, named for our longtime friend and conservation trailblazer Betty Merck, houses our science and education staff, and includes a large meeting room and science classroom. A small outbuilding near the cottage houses our science laboratory and a former garage on the property has been converted into a light-filled interpretive center named the Raritan Room.
We have worked to make upgrades to improve the energy efficiency of the farmhouse and cottage, while taking great care to maintain their historic and charming character.
The barns – painted in their original colors of hunter green with white trim – were constructed in the early 1800s with hand-axed native oak beams connected by hand-cut pinned joints.
In the late 1990s, URWA’s Board of Trustees grew concerned about the deteriorating condition of the barns and decided to repair and restore them. Vintage Barns of High Falls, N.Y., was chosen for the restoration project in 2000, and completed work in May 2001. The Historical Society of the Somerset Hills honored the project with a Historic Preservation Award in 2005.
Today, the barn complex is structurally sound and an integral part of our campus. The smaller barns house a nature education classroom and space for storing property stewardship equipment. The larger main barn is used for farm-to-table dinners and is the centerpiece of our annual Old Fashioned Country Fair.
This seasonal checklist was created primarily using data collected on weekly and additional walks conducted between May 25, 2016, and May 25, 2019, with the exception of three weeks in August each year. E-bird records beginning in 1991 were also used. Walks took place early in the morning and lasted between 3 and 5 hours. Participant numbers ranged between 3 and 12 and averaged around 6. I would like to thank the many people, too numerous to mention, who generously gave their time to make this list possible. Alan Rennie.
This checklist is also available as a pocket card. Stop by Fairview Farm to pick up a copy.
