Golden Ridge Animal Farm

I haven't been to Golden Ridge for a couple of years, and wasn't overly impressed with it back then (I didn't think it had the best conditions due to high numbers of animals in a small space), but I'm told it has improved now. I guess it's a case of people finding out for themselves, but if you're quite sensitive to animals, then be cautious.

We recently took 35 kids to Golden Ridge for a school holiday program. The kids had a ball! The staff were attentive, knowledgeable and the day ran smoothly. I was particularly impressed with the compassion and patience shown to the children who were nervous of the animals. The children were given the confidence to try new things from patting a duckling to milking a cow and EVERY child left with a grin on their faces and many with a new found love for animals.

It was a real hands on farm experience- no concrete paths, no fast food stalls just healthy, happy, friendly animals in paddocks, the smell of hay, wonderful staff and a fun day out. We all had a fantastic time and highly recommend it to anyone.

Would advise you follow the farms recommendation and wear gumboots or similar.
Hands on experience where the kids get to handle and feed many animals. Supportive, friendly staff.
Definitely not a con just an idea: Possibly finding a way to incorporate simple snacks/tea/coffee/kids drinks?

I have visited this farm several times in the last 4 years since having my daughter. She was very nervous of all animals and as advised by the farm we have visited several times to get her used to them... now she LOVES them all. It was the care and experience of the farmers and staff at golden ridge who helped her over come her fears. I cant thank them enough.
It is a very hands on farm you milk a cow, feed the baby lamb with milk, hold ducks and rabbits. You can buy a bucket if you want to feed the bigger animals.
Its cheaper to visit than other farms around and heaps cheaper than the zoo. they have pony rides too for extra.
The animals are all looked after and happy.
There is a small cafe you can buy snacks and drinks.

My wife and I had a great day out with my 2 year old daughter and got some great photos holding the baby ducks and rabbits. We also got to bottle feed baby goats and lambs. Milking a cow was the highlight, They even let me have a go! The farm is set out great with plenty of room for families and birthday parties. We have already booked our daughters 3rd birthday there at the end of the year. The staff were great! They answered all our questions and were very helpful with all kids running around. Possibly the best part is the cost! Absolute bargain. I don't know anywhere where you can go and feed lambs, pat baby ducks and rabbits, have a pony ride, milk a cow and loads more! Looking forward to going back for my daughters bday party, all the staff do a great job and deserve a pat on the back!

Golden Ridge Animal Farm is a family-run business in Dural, West of Sydney. We went in Jan, 2012. $14 per adult, $10 per child over 1. They had kids, chicks, ducklings and rabbits to hold/pet and lots of goats, some sheep, cows, donkeys and horses, geese, dogs and cats, most of which patrons can touch, pet, feed and see up close.
The experience includes holding chicks, ducklings and rabbits, then a tour including feeding the animals (extra $5 for feed bucket), milking a cow, bottle-feeding kids and optional (extra $5) pony rides.

The animals seemed happy and were divine to be close to. They even had a fawn (baby deer) and kids that were less than a week old. I love supporting family-run businesses, and love the idea of this place. But overall, the experience was just OK for three reasons:

1) They have a system whereby you book, then arrive at 10:15 for a 10:30am start. We got there on time but we were left waiting over 45 min (30 min in the scorching sun) for the start, as two groups of people arrived late. If you have small children, you'll know the difficulty in being made to wait that long. They shouldn't have waited for the latecomers, because that pushed back the timing of everything. At 12, we had to leave for our youngest's nap before our older child could get a pony ride, one of the things we were really looking forward to.

2) The girls running the "tour" couldn't have been less interested, providing no information about the animals or what it's like to live on/run an animal farm, etc; normal things you'd expect to hear on such an experience. I got the impression they were sick to death of being on the farm.

3) The place wasn't well kept. The cages in the barn area, each filled with a different bunch of animals: mice, ducklings, chicks, rabbits, etc, were so filthy, you couldn't see through the grime to the animals. I have absolutely no experience raising these kinds of animals, so I don't know how difficult it is to clean the windows of the cages, but it was gross and made me wonder why they even had them if the animals couldn't be seen. They also had huge cow pats on the path and didn't warn anyone before we made our way through that area, so a number of kids stepped right in them. Obviously there's going to be that kind of thing on a farm, but warning the patrons first would be handy, and responding with water or some way to clean shoes.

Since going, I've heard they do most of their business with school groups, which is why they do the tour-style. And it's easier to manage if everyone does all activities at the same time. But we were left waiting around for ages and missing out on the pony ride. It wasn't fair. They should have started on time and had late people miss the first part instead of us missing out on the latter part. They also need to decide if they're still interested in doing this kind of thing, because we got the distinct impression they're letting things go.

There are other animal farms around Sydney, and I'd encourage those above this one, unfortunately.
Great hands-on with animals
Unkempt, disinterested hosts, left waiting 45 minutes, we missed out on part of the experience

I visited this farm recently with my baby and my group of friends with their children ages range 2 - 5. We had a fantastic day and loved every minute of it. We all got to cuddle the little animals and feed the sheep and goats. We bought our own bucket of feed it was $5 but was a decent size that allowed us to feed the animals a second time. After milking the cow ( this did take some time as we waited for everyone to have a go , we went for a little walk around the barn). We got to feed the baby lambs their bottle. The look on the kids faces was amazing as the little lamb drank all the milk.

Yes the farm does look abit run down but after speaking to one of the owners (a young girl) who was running the day she let us know that over the last few years they have spent a lot of money on repairs!! I wondered what it looked like before!! She gave me a little bit of history on the farm and after speaking to her I left knowing that the farm had come a long way with out any government help or funding.
It is a small family run farm its not a zoo. They don't want everything concreted ( even that it would be easier to maintain the owner said) they want to retain a farm like feel.

All the animals were happy, well fed and in clean pens. Some of the animals in the paddocks looked a bit muddy but it had rained heavy for 3 days before our visit. The paddocks do have manure in them but they are paddocks and animals do go to the toilet. I have grown up on a farm in Bathurst and I can see that there are a lot of animals on this property, but not one was skinny or un healthy or sick they all looked well and fat. The owner did tell us that they are selling a lot of them as they are down sizing after the easter show.

We will all visit this farm again, we have visited another farm in sydney since to compare but the other farm was not the same. ( the 5 year old in our group called the other farm boring!)

I don't normally right reviews but I do read them, I think that some of the negative reviews on here are un just. I feel sorry for these people who wrote bad reviews they obviously had a bad time.

I went with a open mind and am glad I did it was fantastic!!
And if you are unsure about anything ask the farmer they are happy to have a chat and explain things to you... Like we did!!
This was a cheap day out, everyone gets a turn of everything, I even got to bottle feed the little lamb
A bit muddy but we wore gumboots as suggested to us. No cafe or shop. We will take a thermos next time!

We went for the farmer for a day Easter eggstravaganza.. No where on the website does it say accompanying adults are charged the same price as the kids which on this day was $25.. Fair enough I can deal with that, but then on top of that $5 for feed, $5 for a pony ride, $3 for an egg to smash in a competition, there was a sausage sizzle advertised but when you were ready for lunch you had to go to a lunch truck and wait for a sausage to be cooked. I just feel like it was very poorly organised..
I wish that was the end of my review but unfortunately I bring my attention to the staff, one of the rudest young ladies I have ever come across works there, if you call it works, she couldn't even do the pony saddle properly and ended up tying it in a know underneath the poor animal, said I'll be back and then dissappeared, only to pop up 10 metres away doing something else and act like we weren't there waiting for her start the pony rides, anyway so I went to have a word with the manager about her attitude and he seemed to just laugh it off saying oh she'll be on pig duty for the rest of the day.
Now, for the poor animals that have obviously been terrible people in their past lives. They've been sent back to pay for their sins over and over again as children mishandle them as there is no adequate supervision by staff not parents. I've never seen so many lambs and goats in such a small space I wonder what happens to them when they grow up?? The lambs were absolutely covered, and I mean covered in flies. It was a sad sight.
Today they only had one session one but for Saturday and Sunday there is 2 per day. I can only imagine what a shmozzle it is going to be and I'm so glad we didn't end up going to the 2nd one tomorrow.

We enjoyed Be a Farmer for a Day. Great fun was had by our kids, lots to do, painting, jumping castle, sheep and goat races, gum boot tossing, sack races, feeding animals, holding baby ducks, chickens, or rabbits, bottle feeding baby lambs, goats (kids), milking a cow and goat and pony rides. Kept us entertained and excited. My autistic son had time and spaces to step out of the crowd and noise to calm down and enjoy himself.

I took the family to the Golden Ridge Farm last weekend it was great we arrived at the 10.45 am arrivle time and we entered at 10.55 we looked around the animals indoor for a few mintes before we where asked to sit down for the start of the activites.

The owner a young lady told us alittle about the farm and then got the baby animals out for us to hold the children loved it, Mike my 3y old has never held a rabbit befor and sarah is 5y she loved the little chicks and ducklings.

We went on a walk to feed the out side animals goats, sheep, deer, cows, ponies, donkey, alpaca, llama and the children loved it they come up to the fence so you can hand feed them and pat them.

The children got to milk the cows and then the best part was the bottle feeding the baby lamb and the baby goats.

we brought a picnic lunch and then the children had a pony ride we have some great photos and it was a cheep day of we are going to take some friends next school holidays.

As to the farms look it is a little rustic, it is over 40 years old but everything was clean the animals are clean and healthy and the staff were great.

I cant wait to go back.
cheap, hands on for the children, the animals are so nice, only 40 min drive from bondi
you can buy food there, but thats all

My wife and daughter paid and entered the farm while my 8 years old son and I waited at the car park. Son complained and need to use a toilet. The middle age female farm attendant refused to let my son use the toilet with an excuse that WE HAVE TO PAY TO USE THEIR TOILET!!!! It felt so cold. That was the first i heard in Australia!!! Never go back again. Very disappointed that such a poor attitude/treatment found in tourism insdustry.

We found that this business has an active Facebook page with 12708 followers. From our experience this can indicate that the business is trustworthy and popular among people. We have discovered that this business has SSL (secure sockets layer), which means that this business handles your data, such as personal information or credit card details, with secure connection. We discovered that the domain for this business is relitevely new, which means that it could be a start-up business that does not yet have a huge amount of customers. We found that this business has an Instagram page, where they communicate with their customers using images and videos. This is usually an indication that the business has some visual aspects that it wants to showcase.