Silverman's Farm

Cute store, great pies. Kinda pricy. Transforms into full blown kid amusement park in the fall. Aside from the full time zoo, in fall they add hay rides and the "Cereal Bowl", which is a big hay bale arena complete with tunnels and filled with dried corn kernels. (Think giant grains of sand.) Outrageously fun for kids. Expect crowds and traffic September through October.
7 years ago (11-02-2018)

I'll preface this by saying that my daughter had a really good time, as do almost all little kids who go there (hence why it becomes over-crowded madhouse on the weekends in fall.) This place is an overpriced tourist trap. They charge you for every single thing, and everything is expensive. For myself and my young daughter to get into the small petting zoo and feed the animals was $15. For us to get two small bags of apples (that we picked ourselves) was $26. A small bottle of apple cider was $2.50. All of the baked goods are pricey. The store is cute and pretty well stocked, but it's all stuff you could get elsewhere; there's little that's original and it's no old-fashioned New England store. They don't even have regular bathrooms to use, they only have port-o-pots. You'd think for what they charge they could have a bathroom or two. If you don't mind spending money, and dealing with obscene crowds on the weekend, it's a fun place to go to once for the experience. After that, go to some of the other family farms to get the same experience for less money and fewer people.
8 years ago (18-10-2017)

We purchased train ride tickets for 4 adults with a baby. When we went to get on, the train was full. The driver told us to wait 30 minutes for the next ride and we'd be the first ones on. So we waited right there but when it was time to get on, a crowd of people pushed ahead of us and took all the seats. The driver made NO effort to accommodate us (even though he said if we waited there we'd be first on). The driver kept saying rudely to us "you need to be seated". There we NO seats. We waited 15 minutes in line for cider and donuts only to be told when we got to the counter, they were ALL OUT of both. The animal farm was pitiful. We paid $45 for the train with no seats and a animal farm that was NOT impressive at all. Save your money. Go somewhere that is better organized and polite and accommodating.
8 years ago (07-10-2017)

(This review is from our visit in October 2017) This was our first time to Silverman's Farm, but it won't be the last. We were looking for something like the lovely experience we had last summer at Alstede Farm in New Jersey, but closer to our family in CT. Finding this farm in google maps, we came across a truly mixed bag of reviews, with negative ones claiming everything from this being a tourist trap to rude staff to overly expensive everything. We were pleasantly surprised to find the negatives disproven by a really lovely fall day spent outside. Yes, you have to pay for the animal feeding part, but it was worth it for the large, well spaced, clean animal section. With bunnies, llamas, sheep, emu, goats from all around the world, and even buffalo, our daughter loved it! We were also pleased that despite the Native American section having tipis -Not the housing of northeast tribes - they included signs making clear that these are not dwellings typical of the northeast! They had cultural items from tribes across the country. After feeding animals, our daughter played in the smallish playground area. If your child is 5yrs or older, it is probably not enough to entertain them. But our almost 4yr old liked the slides, maze, and Thomas the train. About 30yards away is also a Duck Derby where up to i think 6 or 7 kids pump water to race ducks down a pipe- we all liked that one. And with some maintenance to fix the one leaky pipe, and the one just plain broken, it would be perfect. After the animals and kids play side, we crossed the street at the crossing guard, and our daughter jumped around in the Cereal Bowl - a large hay bale enclosure, maybe ten yards by 15yards, filled with dried corn kernels. She loved it, and it was like a giant sand box only we didn't have to brush sand out of her hair all night, just a few kernels of corn. After the corn pit, we were all starving and forced to overpay for food, because all that was available were a few food trucks - hence the one missing star. $4.50 for a microscopic slice of pizza is insane - and we live in NYC, so we know overpriced pizza! The meatball sandwiches were a far better bang for your buck, but overall the food options left a lot to be desired. We then went up to do some apple picking and it was all we could have hoped for And more! A lovely, bumpy tractor up to hillside orchards, encouragement to eat apples as we picked, and lots of other families, in a rainbow of diverse ethnicities and races, all wandering among the autumn trees. On our way out we picked up a pumpkin, you don't pick it from the field yourself, but that was ok. We wish the train rides had been running for kids, but maybe next season. Over all we really enjoyed ourselves. Between the cost of the animals feeding part $16 (plus about $1.50 in corn to feed them), and the apples bag (for kids under 4, as ours is, you don't have to pay for them to pick) of $19, and the hefty cost of the so-so quality food trucks (about $15), it was NOT a cheap adventure. But considering you could spend most of the day there, bring packed food from home, and that the cost includes a crazy amount of yummy apples, we felt it was worth it.
7 years ago (20-01-2018)

I used to take my kids about 10 years ago and it was nice. Now is way too expensive and they force you to buy a bag per person. Were were a 7 person group mostly kids. I was not going to spend $70 to pick blueberries. The petting zoo is a bit pricey but they have new animals and is clean. The store is nicer and has more stuff but is a tourist trap more than a real farm store. I think the other farm, 2 minutes down the road from this one is way better. I think Silverman's farm just got too big and greedy. What a shame!
8 years ago (07-08-2017)