A family ranchMara Valley, British Columbia

Windrose Ranch

Hay, herds, and music between the windrows and the wilderness

Windrose Ranch is the McNeill family's farm, tucked between the winding Shuswap River and the snowcapped peaks of Hunters Range. Here, at the edge of wilderness and windrows, we make hay, make music, milk goats — and make the most of the land, the life, and the people we've been given in this little community.

Evening light striking the forested mountainside above the ranch meadow

Generations of handshave cleared these fields.

Hay &field work

We make hay from our own fields and from several round about — pure alfalfa, alfalfa-grass mix, or straight grass, depending on the field and the cut. In spring and fall, when a bale won't dry, we wrap it the same day for silage. Most of our hay is very good, off very good fields; now and then we hay a lower-quality field too. Either way, you'll know exactly what you're buying, and it'll be priced accordingly. And when your own fields are ready, we bring the iron to you. See what's in the barn →

Windrows of fresh hay leading toward the farmhouse and valley beyond — First cut, drying in the sun

Tractor and rotary rake building windrows in the field — Raking ahead of the baler

Round bales scattered across a hillside field with blue mountains behind — Rounds on the upper bench

Horses grazing while the irrigation gun and sprinkler lines water the field — Water on, early summer

Making Hay — Custom work for our neighbors

It takes four to six passes between standing grass and finished hay.

1 Mow The disc mower lays the stand down in smooth swaths. The mower has a conditioning bar which crushes the grass stems so they dry faster.
2 Ted The tedder fluffs it loose so the sun and wind get at every stem. We may ted grass multiple times, but you have to be careful tedding alfalfa so you don't cause the leaves to fall off.
3 Rake Raked into windrows — the ridges the ranch is named for. If there's dew or the ground is moist, we may have to turn the hay a time or two.
4 Bale The baler swallows each windrow and rolls it tight. We usually make round bales that are 4x5 and weigh about 800 lbs, but can make larger bales on request.
5 Wrap Spring and fall bales that won't dry get sealed in film the same day.

Ask about hay & field work

The crew on the iron

Owen McNeillMowing, raking, baling. Violinist in the off-hours.
Caleb McNeillBaling, hauling, skid-steer and custom jobs. Drummer when the field work's done.
Liam TimmermansOur good friend. Can make a skid steer dance a jig.

The three-man haying crew in front of stacked bales in the hay shed — Owen, Caleb & Liam

A round bale in the mown field under a blazing valley sunset

Beautiful hay ina beautiful place.

Herds

The kids raise the flock themselves — a few animals go to 4H each year — and the girls milk the goats every morning. We raised most of these animals from birth; we know every one by name (or number), whether they answer to it or not.

Nubian doe and kid grazing in dandelion-speckled pasture — Spring pasture, first shift

Nubian kid with long ears nibbling a blade of grass, up close — Born here, raised here

Goats and sheep spread across a wide green pasture under a moody sky — Out on grass

Three newborn goat kids snuggled up together — Trouble, times three

The dairy herd

The girls milk our Nubians every morning through spring and summer — rich, high-butterfat milk that becomes the household's yogurt, cheese, and soap if we have enough. Kids arrive every spring, and a few are always for sale.

Spring kids · reserve early

The lamb flock

Our sheep spend their lives between the pasture and the pen — which is a bit safer from predators at night. We sometimes sell lamb by the whole or half.

Lamb · sometimes available

Meet the animals What's for sale

A rainbow arcing over the ranch's green pasture and treeline

Some eveningsthe valley shows off.

Music

When the chores are done, the ranch changes key. We teach piano and violin to children from across the valley and we make a lot of our own music too.

Rebecca has taught piano for 30 years. Owen teaches violin and is kind to squeaky beginnings. Lessons at the house and the Mara Community Hall.

Lessons, classes & teachers Ask about lessons

Theplace

The ranch sits with the winding Shuswap River to the west and the peaks of Hunters Range rising to the east — right where the river slips through farmland into Mara Lake, at the seam where the arid Okanagan gives way to the rain-soaked Monashees and Selkirks.

Generations of farmers — from more families than ours — shaped Windrose out of the slopes and timber. Flat land was limited and rocks were not, so each of them did their part hauling stones, large and small, to the piles at the field edges. They sit mossy now, like little memorials to past generations' work. If you see a rock, you too can take part in the process.

The hay grows on little fields of five to fifteen acres, joined by long farm roads and old trails — lower fields at the level of the river, upper fields you climb to over a kilometer of backroad. Just a few hundred yards behind the house the mountains rise and the forest closes in: a thin boundary between the comfortable, cultivated world of the farm and the tangled ravines and crumbling ridges above. The mountain is a constant presence — brooding some days, glowing with the sun's last light on others, heavy and smothering with snow all winter. Its water and its wildlife both come down to us. The elk and deer are usually content with a mouthful of alfalfa, and so are the black bears that amble along our trails — but the odd coyote, bobcat, or bear will follow its nose to the sheepfold, where the guardian dogs keep them at bay.

Mara Lake from the ridge, golden larches on the mountainsides — Mara Lake from the ridge, larch season

The lake and mountains through summer timber — The lake through summer timber

Mountains rising beyond the timbered edge of the hay fields — The ranges beyond the field edge

A bull elk standing in the fresh-raked windrows — Sometimes the wilderness wanders into the windrows

A whitetail buck grazing in the tall growth at the field edge — — and helps itself to a mouthful

A black bear ambling through thick summer brush — A black bear ambling our trails

A moose coming down the forest trail — A moose coming down our trail

A bobcat slipping down the mossy trail — A bobcat slipping past

Seasons of Windrose

A rainbow arcing over the green spring fields — **Spring**The Shire — soft green, the odd rainbow, sometimes two.

Round bales dotting a freshly baled field — **Haying**Bales on the ground and the whole valley smelling of cut grass.

The tractor and rake working under big summer clouds — **Haying**Bales on the ground and the whole valley smelling of cut grass.

Golden larches on the mountainside above a green field — **Fall**The larches turn and the whole place goes gold.

A cross-country skier following the fence line through deep snow — **Winter**Fence-post-deep snow, short days, long sunsets.

A fiery winter sunset over the snowed-in fields — **Winter**Fence-post-deep snow, short days, long sunsets.

About us

We're a big family, working together. The girls milk every morning, the kids trade off riding the three Morgans, a few animals go to 4H, and everyone helps out with the hay.