Never underestimate the power of a determined flower farmer.
In 1999, when Susan and Herb Lamb moved to Cleveland in White County, they were thinking of starting a seasonal, part-time retirement business. They tried growing sunflowers, but groundhogs ruined the plants.
Lavender was a personal favorite, both for fragrance and for culinary use, and Susan thought it might be something the groundhogs, deer and rabbits would leave alone. So, she began her plans to start a lavender farm.
“When you’re going to do something you know nothing about, and plan to spend thousands of dollars to do it, you turn to the experts,” she said. “I called the White County extension service and they told me, you can’t grow lavender here.”
A letter from the Hall County extension office said the same thing. After all, the conventional wisdom went, lavender grows best in dry, arid climates, which doesn’t describe North Georgia.
Twenty-four years later, that letter is framed and sits on a shelf in the shop where the Lambs sell simple syrup, jams, shortbread cookies, lotions, oils and more, all made with the lavender grown on their 3-acre Lavender Lamb Farm.
Credit: Moni D Photography
Credit: Moni D Photography
During a 2015 trip to the Lavender Festival in Roswell, they met people growing lavender in Georgia and learned about the U.S. Lavender Growers Association. Armed with enthusiasm and a bit more knowledge, the next year the Lambs put in 500 lavender plants — and lost almost half of them immediately.
A connection through the lavender growers group introduced Susan Lamb to Ellen Reynolds of Beagle Ridge Herb Farm in Virginia.
“I posted pictures of our dying plants and said, ‘I need help,’” Lamb said. “Ellen said you need ‘dirty limestone,’ so we brought home limestone from a quarry near Chattanooga. When I took pictures of us planting, my new friend said, ‘That’s not dirty limestone.’”
Lamb sent her husband to Virginia to get the right kind of limestone, and their lavender-growing fortunes turned. Trial and error taught them, for example, that their rows need to run diagonally across the slope of their land, to maximize drainage.
And they learned what varieties would grow best. One doing well for them is bridget chloe, bred by John Hendon of Blairsville. In early summer, the plants will be covered with fragrant spikes of vivid purple flowers that hold their strong fragrance when dried. The Lambs offer lavender plants for sale each year. They also sell bags of “lavender dirt,” a mix of soil and dirty limestone that they recommend gardeners mix half and half with their soil.
Credit: Handout
Credit: Handout
Lamb said it’s a continual surprise that people will come down their dirt road “in the middle of nowhere” to see the farm and buy lavender products. The season varies each year, but through June 23 they are offering you-pick days, with 30-minute sessions. When lavender season is over, the farm holds zinnia you-pick days, generally from mid-July through August.
In the future, she hopes to expand the culinary items they carry. Because they do not have a packaged food license, the Lambs have a co-packer who produces the mixes, jams and simple syrup they sell, all made with the farm’s lavender, which also is used to make lavender-infused coffee by JumpinGoat Coffee Roasters in Cleveland.
“When we first started,” she said, “people didn’t think about lavender as something you would eat, but it’s becoming more mainstream.”
If you visit the farm, the Lambs have food and drink flavored with lavender available to sample. Lamb is happy to share recipes and she’s particularly proud that her lavender chicken salad recipe was published in Georgia Connector Magazine a few years ago.
The farm’s shop is open 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Saturdays, April through Labor Day, October and November. Other visits can be made by appointment.
Lavender Lamb Farm. 176 Bugle Drive, Cleveland. 706-865-0610, lavenderlambfarm.com
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