Badger Creek Ranch is a family owned and operated working ranch high above the Arkansas river valley in central Colorado. Working in alliance with our non-profit, Full Circle Alliance, our primary focus is land restoration and education. We're not a dude ranch, or even a guest ranch, but more of an educational center, with our Working Ranch Stewardship experience being an opportunity for guests to be part of our staff. We serve our ranch-raised meats and locally sourced food to our guests as often as we can. We also sell our ranch-raised meats to our meat customers via our website and local farmers markets.
Our goals are education, conservation and preservation of the land. Our ultimate goal is putting the land in trust for future generations.
Good time to go
From May through September there isn't a bad day to be at Badger Creek Ranch.
Children at the Ranch
Great for children aged 13 and over
Working Ranch Stewardship package - While we love children of all ages, due to the nature of our horse program and cattle work, guests must be able to ride independently. This is a more adult-focused ranch stay and to get the most out of a BCR stay, we recommend that our guests be at least 13 years of age.
Minimum age children can ride
13 and over
Activities
hiking, biking
Games
board games, horseshoes
Environmental & Social Practices
Environment
“Green” Ranching
Here at Badger Creek Ranch, we believe that we are caretakers of this land. We practice living “green” and continue to learn and expand in this area. BCR is an “off the grid” property. This means that we rely on solar power for our energy use. We do our best to be mindful of this and build our energy use routines around the daylight hours in order to conserve fuel needed otherwise. The ranch composts all organic materials including manure from the animals and scraps from our kitchen. This compost then gets used as fertilizer for our garden and hay meadows. We recycle all plastic, cardboard and aluminum in order to minimize what goes into the landfill. We reuse MANY materials for our projects. This may include things like lumber, fencing materials, nails and screws. We use organic/non toxic cleaning supplies, laundry detergents and soaps in order to keep our runoff water clean and safe for the environment. We do our best to be minimal in our consumption AND our waste. We believe strongly in these practices and will strive to expand and share our knowledge.
Community
BCR produces beef, pork, lamb and eggs which we sell at the local Farmers Market in Salida, CO. We host community events at the ranch. We're members of the Salida Chamber of Commerce and on the board of several local organizations, including: Rocky Mountain Farmers Union, Foodshed Alliance, Chaffee County Food Coalition.
Conservation
Sustainable Agriculture
Sustainable agriculture is a philosophy based on the integration of human goals and the understanding of the long-term impact of our activities on the environment and on other species.
As stewards of Badger Creek Ranch, we recognize our responsibility to care for the land, which includes all the grasses that grow here, the soil, the water, and all the animals that live here, domestic and wild; predator and prey. For this reason we practice holistic management, a process of decision making and planning that maintains and improves the health of the land for future generations, with the goal of raising healthy, flavorful food to serve our guests, and sell to customers seeking all-natural products including grass fed meats, eggs, and other farm/ranch raised goods.
Ranch History
Our working cattle ranch is located in Colorado's Badger Creek Basin at approximately 9,000 feet on the Ute Trail (Fremont County Road #2), 40 miles northwest of Canon City and 20 miles northeast of Salida, with spectacular views of the Collegiate Peaks and the Sangre De Cristo Mountains.
The area is rich in history. From the Ute Indians, who had their summer hunting grounds here, to the Spanish Conquistadors, to the pioneers, miners, and cowboys of the old West, to our present day Badger Creek Ranch, this is a land of countless tales, both fact and fiction.
Your Manager, Chrissy and Dave McFarren
Co-owners Chrissy and Dave are passionate about ranching and farming, and are deeply humbled to be stewards of the land. Chrissy loves creating healthy environments for all the animals (domestic and wild) that call the ranch their home, and loves bearing witness to the joy people have when they visit the ranch. Dave is “The back-office guy": doing the books, managing the meat inventory, and maintaining the equipment. He loves entertaining the guests on 'music night' and being the face of BCR at the farmers markets where they sell their meats and eggs.