VALLEY SHEPARD CREAMERY NJ

Valley Shepard Creamery- New Jersey

An old fashioned creamery welcomes you and your family to a unique farm experience in New Jersey. 120 beautiful acres in Long Valley, Morris County, NJ, within an hour of New York City!

We have combined years of artisan cheesemaking expertise with modern equipment from around the world and age old European sheep farming practices to create Valley Shepherd Creamery. We take pride in being able to educate and involve the visitor in daily life of a real working sheep dairy while creating over thirty styles of artisan cheeses, yogurt and butter. March and April

Our year starts off in mid March when our ewes begin to give birth. On average, a new lamb is born every 15 minutes around the clock during March and April! This keeps us rather busy the entire spring. When the mothers are ready, we begin milking them twice a day on our ewenique European rotary milking parlor. While our ladies enjoy a snack, they are milked on our special carousel that fully milks the animal in one full rotation. It only takes about 3 minutes! We start shearing in April when the weather changes and our ewes don’t need their winter coats any longer. Don’t miss our Sheep Shearing Tours –they’re great for the whole family! May thru July:

While our ladies spend their summer days grazing our pastures, the hustle and bustle of the cheese room begins. In addition to our Cultured Butter and Sheep’s Milk Yogurt, we produce 30 different styles of raw and pasteurized cheeses. May is the start of many local farmer’s markets that we attend weekly throughout NJ and NYC. Late spring is an especially cute and cuddly time of year, as it’s when you can come meet our lambs! For more information regarding our spring lamb tours, please click here. August through November:

As summer draws to a close and the leaves begin to change, our hillside aging cave is filled with hundreds of wheels of cheese. Take a tractor ride up to the cave to learn more about the process of aging cheese. Once the holidays begin to approach, cheese making slows down, and our attention shifts to creating beautiful gift baskets. Farm life can be hectic, but the ability to work closely with our animals, our products and our customers is more rewarding than anything else!