Graywood Farm 1.jpg
Buy Now

Lisa Graybeal, center, co-owner of Graywood Farms in Peach Bottom, stands with two migrant workers, Nicolas Cruz, left, and Nicolas Hernandez in the milking parlor on Wednesday, Feb. 1, 2023. Graybeal, a third generation family farmer, has been at the forefront of trying to change classification so season agricultural workers can work year round. The 800-head, 1,200 acre dairy farm milks cows three times a day. The Graybeal family has now preserved eight farms in Fulton Township. 

 SUZETTE WENGER | Staff Photographer

Lancaster County preserved six farms using $37,000 of county funds and $1.76 million from the state. The preserved farms total 482 acres. 

The six preserved farms include the John S. and Esther S. Beiler Farm, a 74-acre dairy farm in Colerain Township; the Reuben Z. and Naomi S. Beiler Farm, a 87-acre crop and livestock farm in Salisbury Township; the Victoria K. Graybeal Farm, a 103-acre crop farm in Fulton Township; the William E. and Diane K. Hershey Farms #1 and #2, a 118-acre dairy farm and an 80-acre crop farm in Little Britain Township; and the Randall C. and Maria R. Kreider Farm, a 20-acre crop farm in Manor Township. 

The Shapiro administration announced the preservation of these farms on Aug. 25, noting that 2,645 total acres had been preserved across 35 farms in 18 counties. 

Preserved farms are protected in perpetuity from residential or commercial development. The preserved farms mentioned in the Aug. 25 announcement are in Adams, Allegheny, Beaver, Berks, Chester, Columbia, Cumberland, Dauphin, Erie, Lackawanna, Lancaster, Lebanon, Lehigh, Lycoming, Montgomery, Northampton, Union and York counties.

Tom Daniels, who studies land use and environmental planning at the University of Pennsylvania and is a former director of the Lancaster County Agricultural Preserve Board, noted in a June interview that Lancaster County has the most preserved farmland of all U.S. counties. 

“It’s worth preserving the farmland here because it’s so good and it’s so productive,” Daniels said, adding that Lancaster is the No. 1 agricultural county in Pennsylvania and one of the top 20 in the United States. 

Counting the 35,000 acres preserved by the Lancaster Farmland Trust and the more than 85,000 acres preserved by the Agricultural Preserve Board, the county tops 120,000 preserved acres and more than 1,500 preserved farms, Daniels said. He calculated that number to be 30% of all agricultural land in the county.

Want to see our latest stories highlighting local and national business headlines? Sign up for our free weekly Business newsletter here.

Newsletter

What to Read Next

Tags