GRAND ISLE, Vt. (WCAX) – After a devastating fire at the end of 2022, the Savage View Farm is back with about 180 cows.
“It’s wonderful to see this revived and the amount of work that’s gone into is just incredible,” Grand Isle resident Joan Sylvester said.
Savage View Farm has other barns in the area where some of the rescued cows stayed during rebuilding.
This is the first time many locals are seeing the new barn after the cows moved into it in January.
“Seeing it, this has been my first opportunity, and I was very happy to find they were having a barn warming and explaining the technology and seeing the number of animals that are being raised here and milked here and fed here by you know the local cropping, so it was wonderful,” Sylvester said.
An unexpected fire in 2022, to a soggy summer in 2023 and a mild winter in 2024, the farm preserved.
“We’re just doing what we’re doing every day working hard and you know no matter what the weather was or despite the fire, we just push through every day and keep on going every day and whether it’s rain or shine, the cows need to be fed,” Farmer Sara Griswold said.
And seeing the barn come back to life warms Griswold’s heart.
“Last time like I said we had seen it, it was, you know under ashes,” Griswold said. “So to see it come back a little bit at a time we were able to save some of things like the headlocks that you see that the cows are in and the cement that is here today so just seeing you know the walls start to go back up and that roof and the tin be put on and then finally watching the girls come back into the new home and run in here — very exciting.”
Ryan Bullis of Savage View Farm says a barn warming is a great way to thank all of their community members who helped during the fire.
“We had a lot of community come out and help us. During that time, we thought it was a good idea to have them come back and see what we put back up and invite people to the farm,” Ryan Bullis of Savage View Farm.
The farm hopes to give back to the community even more in the future.