Beacon Hill Children's Farm

Beacon Hill Children's Farm www.beaconhillchildrensfarm.ca Our goal is to help children develop a respect for animals that will remain with them for life. Enjoy your visit!

The Beacon Hill Children’s Farm, located within beautiful Beacon Hill Park of Victoria, B.C., is pleased to bring the farm animal experience into the city. Operated since 1985 by the Koenders family in conjunction with the Beacon Hill Farm Society, the Beacon Hill Children’s Farm takes pride in providing both an educational and economical form of entertainment for the whole family. The hands-on ex

perience, particularly with the most popular feature that is the goat petting area, encourages children be compassionate toward living creatures.

Looking for a covered storage for our 1933 ford truck, not running at the moment, will need to be towed
03/19/2025

Looking for a covered storage for our 1933 ford truck, not running at the moment, will need to be towed

Second day of the farm being open and the sun is out! 🌞Come by to visit the animals after the winter break.We are open d...
03/13/2025

Second day of the farm being open and the sun is out! 🌞
Come by to visit the animals after the winter break.

We are open daily 10am to 4pm - weather permitting.

March 12th , today is OPENING DAY!! Our hours are 10-4 daily, and the goat stampedes are 10:10 and 4:10 daily. See you s...
03/12/2025

March 12th , today is OPENING DAY!! Our hours are 10-4 daily, and the goat stampedes are 10:10 and 4:10 daily. See you soon

Our Osmond: cozy warm and enjoying the view 🦙❤️❄️This big white guy is our ⛄️ - he actually doesn’t mind this weather an...
02/08/2025

Our Osmond: cozy warm and enjoying the view 🦙❤️❄️

This big white guy is our ⛄️ - he actually doesn’t mind this weather and still loves to spend lots of time outside and wander around in the snow.
His lady friend Lacy is more of a good weather creature and she tends to hang out a lot inside (she is somewhere behind him in the barn).

Taffy and Opal are dressed for the cold in their best winter blankets.
02/04/2025

Taffy and Opal are dressed for the cold in their best winter blankets.

Lacy and Osmond are making the best of this sunshine to stay warm and relax. And luckily they also have their amazingly ...
01/22/2025

Lacy and Osmond are making the best of this sunshine to stay warm and relax.
And luckily they also have their amazingly thick coats that protects them for the cold temperatures.

Opal and Taffy are staying warm and cozy during this cold weather.
01/20/2025

Opal and Taffy are staying warm and cozy during this cold weather.

We hope you all had a peaceful, restful and joyful Holiday season and we like to wish everyone a good start into 2025 an...
01/10/2025

We hope you all had a peaceful, restful and joyful Holiday season and we like to wish everyone a good start into 2025 and all the best to carry you through this coming year.

Now we like to take a moment to reflect on the past year, however trying to decide what could be the key points of 2024 is a challenge. There is always so much going on, many little things that keep us on our toes and add a kind of sparkle to each workday. And then there are also some big events every year - good and bad. It is difficult to paint a complete picture for you, though overall we had a good season with its ups and downs. Here are a few topics that we’ve picked out for you:

First we would like to introduce a new farm resident: our cat “Elsie” who already snuck into our life in the fall of 2023. For a while we were fostering her at the farm, but it soon became clear that this shy but obnoxious little kitty had already wiggled her way into everyone's heart (at least in all the human hearts; it took a little longer with our senior cat Leo to be ok with the competition of this “youngling”) and that she has found her forever home with us. Early in 2024 she went for all her medical check ups and vaccinations, microchipping and spaying. Since then she has been on duty as our “cute rodent control”. She is very good at her job, the only issue is that she likes to leave “proof” of her night shifts in very inconvenient but prominent places - like the front entrance desk or the staff office.

January 2024 challenged us with “arctic” temperatures which is tough on the animals and makes taking care of them a lot more work-intense. At this point we like to give a huge THANK YOU to the staff team as it took a lot of hard work and energy to get through those workdays. Working under conditions with freezing winds, dealing with frozen water buckets several times a day, having only access to one source of running water and a limit of just 2 heated rooms on the farm (one of which was pretty much full time used to defrost water buckets and the other one is the home of a lot of our birds and guinea pigs) makes for difficult work conditions, but everyone was all in to provide the animals with all the care they needed during these very cold weeks. Great job Team!
On the last day of the freezing temperatures (where we thought -wrongly- that things were about to get better), an early morning phone call from the park staff informed us that there was a “small water leak” from the farm. Upon arriving at the farm we were up for a “surprise”. Each person might define a small water leak differently, but we were astonished to see that half the road was frozen from the farm main entrance all the way down to the goat petting area due to water that was emanating from the pig yard. We are very grateful to the park workers who were there to help. But shutting off the water only solved the immediate problem. Now we needed that broken pipe fixed ASAP to be able to keep on providing for the animals - and of course we were not the only ones in Victoria with a plumbing emergency. We reached out to our plumber and explained our predicament, and we can’t really put into words how much it meant to us that they said: “We’ll be there within the hour”. That seemed like a miracle. They came promptly, replaced the broken part and we could turn the water back on. We are so grateful for their action and for understanding how essential that was for the animals. THANK YOU!

Then the weather turned milder, we had busy weeks to prepare the farm for our opening date in March. It felt great to welcome visitors, to be able to share with them our stories from the winter and our hopes and expectations for this new season. Spring break was crazy busy as always - every year it is a test for the team to get back into our work routines - and all went well. Our momma goats Papaya, Snowdrop and Snowdrift were showing off their babies as well as showing them this new big world with human visitors. Some of these babies are the first offspring we have of our new billy Beau and they are beautiful, strong and adventurous. We had several more mums expecting and in the summer Lemon Sorbet and Cookies ‘N Cream were able to welcome their little babies as well, followed in June by our mum Tinkerbell who surprised us with the last baby of the year “Pixie”. We had thought Tinkerbell had missed her chance to get pregnant and was just a little chubby looking - but had overlooked the fact that she had been for a short spontaneous date with Beau in mid February and the result of this was the joyous arrival of little Pixie.

Sadly, not all the times in 2024 were filled with happiness and for many of us working at the farm this year is also deeply engraved with loss and sorrow. We do understand that we are a farm and while all our animals are pets, just due to the simple fact that we have so many animals of all ages and with different health conditions, the reality is that we have to say goodbye to some of them. Each time this happens, it’s difficult and heartbreaking for us. We do all we can for our animals during the time they are with us- including daily care, preventative treatments and medical interventions. But sometimes we are helpless and every loss hurts: with every goodbye something breaks and every absence leaves a hole in our middle and our heart. This year we had to say several goodbyes and four of them were members of our dear goat herd. We lost these precious goats to different medical issues, some chronic and worsening over time to the point that it diminished their quality of life and others due to very acute emergencies involving late night trips to the vet and emergency surgery. We tried but we lost.
While we’ll forever miss them:
❤️ BANANAS with her big outgoing personality and her love (and demanding nature) for scratches
❤️ AURORA with her independent soul and a mind that would allow her to always pick a path for just herself
❤️ JUPITER with his sweet youthful and so boyish nature (always happily engaging with the ladies)
❤️ PAPAYA with her gentle, kind and wise soul, this little lady who resembled her famous mother so much
We will also keep on remembering them - through the cherished times we were allowed to spend with and learn from them, the memories we share with everyone who met them and through their herd friends, mothers, siblings and kids they leave behind.

There is so much more that has happened in 2024, but there is simply never enough time or words to write it all down. Just be ensured that life and work with the animals is never boring, it keeps us going, provides us with lots of work and challenges, gives plenty of smiles and tears, costs us sleep and lots of energy, but makes us rich in memories and goat kisses and the trust in their eyes is making it all worthwhile.

We would like to close with our best wishes for the New Year.
We wish for all you to:
🦜 Dance like Mango
🐖 Eat like Petunia
🐓 Greet each morning like Benjamin
🐐 Shine like Sunshine
🦙 Kiss like Osmond
🐐 Run like you are in the goat stampede
🐈‍⬛ Play like Elsie
🦆 Chat like Maud
🐐 Give like our momma goats
🐈‍⬛ Relax like Leo
🐴 Speak up like Opal and Taffy
🐐 Love like Rosie

💗 Simply wishing you all a goat year 💗

Hogs and kisses and a happy New Year to everyone!
01/02/2025

Hogs and kisses and a happy New Year to everyone!

We already know that our lady Lacy really loves to play and splash in the big water puddles (regardless of the currently...
12/30/2024

We already know that our lady Lacy really loves to play and splash in the big water puddles (regardless of the currently cooler weather outside).

And our big guy Osmond totally loves hanging out and rolling in the leave piles!

These two are really such different personalities and each loves different things.

From our barns into your homes we are wishing you all a happy holiday season and a very merry Christmas! 🎄
12/26/2024

From our barns into your homes we are wishing you all a happy holiday season and a very merry Christmas! 🎄

❤️ Looking for a unique gift for an animal lover?❤️ Looking to treat yourself to a personalized certificate with a cute ...
12/17/2024

❤️ Looking for a unique gift for an animal lover?

❤️ Looking to treat yourself to a personalized certificate with a cute animal picture?

❤️ Looking for a way to support the animals during the seasonal farm closure during the wintertime?

Check out our website to learn about the different animals and the options to sponsor them.
www.beaconhillchildrensfarm.ca/sponsor-an-animal/

🐐🐈‍⬛🦜🦙🦚🐓🐖🦆🐴

And to ensure that the certificates will be in time for Christmas under the tree:
For locals to Victoria and the surrounding communities we offer the option to pick up the certificates at the farm (by appointment)
OR for farm supporters from further away we can email you a digital copy of the certificate (while still putting the original paper certificate in the mail).
Please indicate your preference for receiving your certificates while filling out the order.

Thank you for your support ❤️

This Christmas season give the gift of sponsorship!You can sponsor in your own name or as a gift for another animal love...
11/20/2024

This Christmas season give the gift of sponsorship!
You can sponsor in your own name or as a gift for another animal lover.

Visit our website www.beaconhillchildrensfarm.ca/sponsor-an-animal/ to learn more about our farm residents and how you can support them through the winter ahead.

❤️Thank you for your support❤️

Witching everyone a happy and safe Halloween!Please keep in mind that we get really scared of the fireworks.
11/01/2024

Witching everyone a happy and safe Halloween!

Please keep in mind that we get really scared of the fireworks.

Wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving from our barns into your homes. ❤️🍁❤️Today is the last day of our farm season 2024 ...
10/14/2024

Wishing you all a Happy Thanksgiving from our barns into your homes. ❤️🍁❤️

Today is the last day of our farm season 2024 - and there is lots to be grateful for.
We are saying THANK YOU
- for having the privilege of sharing our lives and work with these precious animals, for their patience, their kindness, their trust, their unique personalities and for everything they teach us every single day ❤️
- for so many helping hands from our divers pool of volunteers: such a unique group of people with so many different skills, abilities and talents ❤️
- for the supportive community surrounding us and the beautiful park we work in ❤️
- for all the regular and new farm visitors and animal enthusiasts, their interest in the animals, their care and life at the farm ❤️
- for every smile and kind word shared (especially on some of the more difficult and sad days) ❤️
- for a strong, passionate and dedicated farm team (new and old members) as well as for all the many little tasks that are taken care of in the background, seemingly unseen but never overlooked ❤️
- for the many memories made together. Let’s keep them in our heart forever and we are looking forward to making many more next season ❤️

Thank you

The countdown is on:These are the last days of this season to get some animal visits in.Goat stampede tonight at 4:10pm....
10/12/2024

The countdown is on:
These are the last days of this season to get some animal visits in.
Goat stampede tonight at 4:10pm.

And then there are just 2 more days to visit.
Last days of farm season 2024 is Thanksgiving Monday, October 14th.

On an adventure 🦆
10/10/2024

On an adventure 🦆

Goat cuddles on a rainy day ❤️
10/09/2024

Goat cuddles on a rainy day ❤️

Address

815 Circle Drive, Beacon Hill Park
Victoria, BC
V8V4Z8

Opening Hours

Monday 10am - 4pm
Tuesday 10am - 4pm
Wednesday 10am - 4pm
Thursday 10am - 4pm
Friday 10am - 4pm
Saturday 10am - 4pm
Sunday 10am - 4pm

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