The Fry Family
Andrew has worked on organic vegetable farms, nurseries and landscaping crews for about 15 years, learning on the job with expert gardeners and farmers. In recent years, he has been studying permaculture design, fruit production and mycology.
Julia was brought up in Blacksburg. She is a natural healer and caretaker. She holds it down on the home front, processes and preserves the harvest and practices massage while raising our children.
Fertile soils, rainfall and family ties drew Julia and Andrew to Blacksburg from Austin, TX soon after the birth of their first son in 2019.
Since migrating here, Andrew has been privileged to work and learn with several exceptional farmers in the NRV, including the Pall Family at Glade Road Growing, Adam Taylor at the Catawba Sustainability Center and Bill Wolf of Second Star Farm. Julia has now given birth to three healthy boys and continues to practice massage at the Whole You Studio in Radford.
The Land
In the spring of 2026, the Frys took a leap when the Cox family invited Andrew to manage ThunderCroft farm and grow vegetables in a former horse pasture.
Just 5 miles from downtown Blacksburg, this land has been cared for by the Cox family for the last 12 years. Home to a diverse array of plants and wildlife, unusual geology and dozens of sinkholes indicating subterranean water flow, ThunderCroft is uncommonly beautiful. The farm is also a forever-protected nature preserve where we are continually striving to support natural habitat and implement best practices in farm and forest stewardship.
The Work
Building on a vast body of knowledge amassed over tens of thousands of years, we are carrying on the legacy of countless dedicated farmers and stewards before us.
Our broadest goal is a simple one: to live in harmony with the natural world. This means providing for our most basic needs, like nourishment, without degrading the environment. We view nature as a great web of life, deserving of our reverence and our care.
We recognize the interconnected systems and cycles that we depend on for survival and the many relationships that contribute to human well-being. We seek to sustain and strengthen these relationships.
You might say our work is infinite. We are participating in this endless cycle of energy transfer - from our radiant sun to the plants, animals, fungi and soil that make up our diet and, ultimately, the very cells of our bodies.
Our work is also very practical. To produce an abundance of food while maintaining the fertile, living soils that support healthy plant life, we abstain from using chemical pesticides and herbicides and instead, seek to encourage biological diversity with natural amendments, mulches and compost.
On our small plot, we rotate crops frequently through tightly organized field blocks, grow a variety of “green manures” or cover crops between successions of food crops, compost all garden residue and expired produce and prefer hand tools over tractor implements to minimize disturbance.
We are dedicated to building a more resilient and equitable local food system. One of our driving motivations is to demonstrate what profitable, small-scale food production looks like so it can be replicated again and again.
We are out here every day, participating. We are always learning and growing, with gratitude for the gifts of nature. And we are having a lot of fun doing it. :)
