28 Acres Protected in Leyden, Linking a Corridor of Conserved Land

After decades of championing land conservation in Leyden, Massachusetts — and helping to protect more than 700 acres of farms and forests around town— Warren Facey found himself thinking: why stop now? This year, in partnership with Mount Grace, Warren, the owner of Bree-Z-Knoll Farm, has successfully protected an additional 28-acres of woodland just north of his farm. It’s the final piece of a landscape-scale puzzle that will help complete a continuous corridor of protected land stretching from central Leyden all the way to the Vermont border.

For warren, it’s another meaningful chapter in his lifelong commitment to conservation.

“When we started Bree-Z-Knoll farm, there were sixteen dairy farms in town. Today, we’re the last one.”

“When we started Bree-Z-Knoll farm, there were sixteen dairy farms in town,” he recalls. “Today, we’re the last one. I’ve watched the land where my grandfather grew up get developed and turn into houses. That transformation is part of the reason I got involved in conservation to start with.”

Warren grew up in Greenfield but liked to spend his time on his grandfather’s dairy farm in what was, at the time, in the heart of Leyden’s farming country.

“The farm that my grandfather grew up on was still milking cows and my mother always told my brother and I, ‘you stay right away from it, there’s nothing you need down there.’ Which, to us, translated to: You’ve got to find out what she's talking about! So, we had to go!”

Warren and his brother purchased farmland in Leyden and Wendell respectively. Warren, a former Mount Grace Board Member, put together a multi-landowner conservation project in Leyden, and his brother Bill put together a similar project in his own neighborhood around Mormon Hollow Road in Wendell and Montague.

Warren started Bree-Z-Knoll Farm back in 1968 when he and his wife Sandie bought their first two cows for their three children. Since then, not only has Warren protected the farmland, but he’s also led a town-wide movement to protect the broader landscape too.

Starting in 2012, Warren led a neighbor-wide initiative to protect over 700-acres of forests, farms and fields. When asked about the challenges of organizing the project, Warren told us, “It wasn’t much of a challenge at all, because it’s something I was very passionate about. I got people involved, made phone calls and met with neighbors to talk about the value of land conservation.”

Today, Randy and Angie Facey run the day-to-day operations of Bree-Z-Knoll. Currently, they milk 120 cows with Lely robots. The farm also has 20 dry cows and 100 replacement heifers. The family uses rotational grazing in the spring, summer and fall and grow their own feed for the winter.