Roxane McCoy doesn’t have a lot of time.
The owner of the Screamin’ Oaks Farm near Tonganoxie has her hands full these days, juggling a midnight shift with the Burlington Santa Fe Railroad and welcoming groups of visitors onto her farm.
It’s the kind of life that one may not be able to do without a passion. In McCoy’s case, that passion is for goats and education.
The Screamin’ Oaks Farm was recently certified as an agri-tourism business with the Kansas Department of Commerce. The new designation will put the farm where McCoy has lived for 25 years on a registry with the state.
Screamin’ Oaks will also be one of 16 farms in Leavenworth, Jefferson and Douglas counties featured on the Kaw Valley Farm Tour. McCoy said her farm has been a part of the driving tour, which takes place the first weekend in October, for the last two years. She added that Screamin’ Oaks was also voted “most family friendly” by attendees of the tour.
Besides the buses filled with students and other groups visiting the farm, McCoy also raises dairy goats, in addition to a variety of other animals. McCoy sells the milk the goats produce to local buyers and businesses.
Kansas is one of eight states to allow the consumption of raw dairy products, as long as it is sold on the farm.
Although she said she could upgrade her facility and gain Grade A dairy certification, it would cost her more than $500,000.
“There’s no way I have half a million dollars to invest in becoming a grade A dairy,” she said.
She added that the people who come to her farm to buy milk don’t want a pasteurized product.
Lana Howe is one of those buyers. The owner of Vintage Bath and Soaps in downtown Tonganoxie, Howe said she has bought milk from McCoy since selling her own dairy goats several years ago. Howe said she has been making goat’s milk soap and cheese for eight years, and opened her shop five years ago.
McCoy admitted that there are a number of myths and preconceptions about goats, but that the image is somewhat unfounded. In fact, Howe said goat’s milk can have medicinal benefits, and she said doctors often suggest goat’s milk soap to patients with dry skin.
Drinking the milk can also have benefits, according to McCoy. Similar in nature to milk produced by humans, she said goat’s milk is often fed to babies of a number of different species.
“Our milk has saved foals, bear cubs and a lion cub,” she said. “Anything can survive off of goat’s milk, including human babies because it’s most like mother’s milk.”
In addition to goat’s milk’s universal nature, McCoy said the animal’s tendency to eat weeds may have benefits for anyone who drinks it.
“They eat hedge, thistle and milkweed,” she said. “And they love poison ivy.”
An old adage says that anyone who drinks goat’s milk will develop a resistance to weeds like ragweed or poison ivy that goats enjoy.
“That’s certainly held true for our family,” McCoy said.
Getting the word out on what happens on the Screamin’ Oaks Farm and the benefits of goat’s milk is McCoy’s primary goal, she said.
As part of that education, McCoy houses chickens, turtles, horses, guineas, rabbits, geese, ducks and peacocks on her farm. “We want it to be as educational as possible,” she said.
The groups that visit Screamin’ Oaks get to see first-hand the inner workings of a functioning farm, from milking the goats to feeding the turtles and chickens and growing vegetables. Along the way, McCoy said she details how every creature on the farm serves a purpose.
And though life on the farm is often rewarding, McCoy said managing things alone can be a challenge. While Screamin’ Oaks used to be a family affair, with McCoy’s five children all helping out, she said she has had to do more of the work as her children have moved out of the house.
“Now it’s like people you’ve met along the way,” she said. “Basically it’s a bunch of friends now that believe in this and want to do it.”
Howe helps out with tours and McCoy said she looks to children in 4-H clubs to help out as well. Ron Ehart, a chainsaw sculptor from the area, is also assisting, carving the remains of an oak tree into the likeness of a peacock. The tree was cut down by Kansas City Power and Light in 2000 after a tornado hit the area.
The sculpture serves to direct visitors to the farm, but also serves as an explanation of the name. McCoy said “Screamin’ Oaks” comes from the number of oak trees on the property and the peacocks that roam the grounds, which she said have a propensity to scream.
McCoy will have to juggle her two jobs for another eight years, after which she said she plans to retire and focus on the farm full-time.
After that, she said she is not sure what will happen.
“I hope there’s somebody interested in taking it over,” she said.
However, for now McCoy has other things to think about. Screamin’ Oaks will be included on a tour of farms in the area this fall, and when school returns to session, she said she gets busier. She said she had 10 tours scheduled in a single month last fall.
Even as she anticipates getting busier, McCoy said she is looking to add a symbolic new attraction to her farm — a playground structure shaped like Noah’s Arc.
