welcome to pjf farm
Six distinct plant communities and three ecoregions all meet on PJF Farm and Lodge's (the Farm) 3,500 acres. Hundreds of unique areas have been created and filled with thousands of species of plants, mammals, birds, fishes, reptiles, amphibians, insects, and other invertebrates. If you haven't already noticed, this place is crawling, running, slithering, swimming, and flying with life!
The focus has been on recording the most "watchable" forms of wildlife - plants, birds, butterflies, and dragonflies. Visits and surveys by professional and amateur mammologists (study mammals), ichthyologists (study fish biology), herpetologists (study amphibians and reptiles), and entomologists (study insects) will help update the Farm’s records.
The process of cataloging all these organisms has been steady and ongoing. In only 2.5 years of biological surveying at the Farm, the results have already exceeded expectations.
You can contribute as well! Plant and animal photo records taken here by any of the Farm’s visitors are welcome to be shared with the Farm’s management team by email at pjffarm@percyinc.com.
Our Wildlife
Plant diversity is equally as high here as all the habitat and ecoregional diversity. What is not surprising is that over 400 species have been catalogued in a short amount of time. Some of these include 11 species of oaks, 5 types of hickory, fruiting species (such as red mulberry, southern crabapple, and huckleberry), along with tons of wildflowers, a few of which are shown here.
Our Plants
The bird checklist for the Farm is still in its preliminary stages of development. Many bird species come and go with the seasons. It will take more years of observations from visiting birders in order to add previously unrecorded species and more accurately specify the seasonal status (abundant, common, uncommon, rare, etc.) for each bird species recorded and listed. At this time, the Farm’s bird list contains 186 species. A few of these are shown here.
Our Birds
Our
Butterflies
Some butterflies are dainty and seemingly float along on a cushion of air. Others are so small and swift that they are difficult to see, much less photograph! In fact, many nature photographers visit the Farm mainly to stalk butterflies, which always seem to be in good supply. Many of the butterflies are located along grassy edges of the lakes and along the grassy pipeline right-of-way running along the western edge of the Farm. So far, with lots of help from visitors and professionals, 25 different butterfly species have been recorded at the Farm.
Our Damselflies & Dragonflies
Wetlands cover just over half of the Farm’s acreage. So, it is not surprising that the dragonfly and damselfly populations here are large and diverse. With names like Skimmer, Dasher, Glider, Saddlebag, and Pondhawk, it is easy to see how people can get hooked on watching and identifying these lively little critters. So far, 21 different species have been identified.
