Surrey Docks Farm — Attraction in London

Lovely little city farm - with the animals you’d expect (ducks, donkeys, goats, bunnies, Guinea pigs, pigs) but a seemingly equal focus on growing local.

The visitor entrance is from the Thames path, not the address on the map (more of a vehicle entrance for their lorry that takes animals to local fairs) with some small gardens and a coffee shop.

It’s free to enter and you can go in any direction. Immediately you see goats, the Shetland pony and donkeys in a large courtyard.

Initially it has a vibe similar to many city farms, a bit more concrete than you’d hope with a ‘pallet-anywhere’ approach, but as you explore more, it’s a lot bigger, the sheep have a lot of space, pigs can truly wallow in mud - there’s even a small orchard.

Make sure you go around the outside, there are the ‘stinky pigs’ where you can also see into the building via two windows (one adult height, one kid height); some beautiful cockerels (seriously!) and the many varied and interesting veggie plots.

Keep an eye out all around - from mosaics on the floor to bird houses, clay vegetables, bug hotels, beehives and more. There’s also a lot of interesting blacksmithing work.

There’s a clear focus on education and engagement here which you can see everywhere. On a random Monday we met two adults with additional needs carefully handling bunnies and Guinea pigs and helped my kids to do the same, appreciating the animals.

You might actually want to pop to the farm shop first as animal feed (large oats) is £1/bag, where you can also find reasonably priced gifts, farm produce (including meat!), supporting the charity that runs the farm.

We spent a lovely hour self-directed hour here, with a bit more time and planning we might have paid to feed the goats (see their website) or will come back to do another activity. Though feeding the animals (NOT the donkey or pony!) was quite fun - the goats can be...

It was a great experience, although I expected it to be more like a petting zoo, based on what I saw advertised. It's in fact more of a walk in farm experience than petting zoo. I did get to pet some animals but there's no guarantee you can. There is no organised area with staff that directs you to specific animals you can pet or bring them to you. It's literally just a farm. If you get the attention of some sheep or goats and they're in the mood to let you touch, you can pet them for a bit over/through the fence. There are no free roaming animals (unless you count 2 cute cats walking around). They're all in their respective fenced off areas. You're not allowed to touch the pigs, as there's a warning they can bite. There's no sign anywhere of which animals you CAN pet, so I assumed if there's no sign banning it, it must mean you are allowed to pet. The problem is just with catching the animals in a good mood to be petted. The goats weren't very patient with pets. They just wanted food. You can buy goat feed from the shop on the farm for £1. As long as you feed the goat with one hand, you can get some pets in with the other hand. As soon as you run out of food though, they move away from your hand. The sheep were more docile and enjoyed some pets. Got to pet a couple of nice cows as well. The donkeys, poneys or chickens didn't come around for pets.

It was still a very fun experience since I love being...

A small farm where children can get up close to the animals staff are absolutely lovely people we have been going regularly since my son was about 7 (he's 16 now)but still loves this place the animal experiences are soon worth it the staff will really try and make it special for children and are very knowledgeable about the animals just to give everyone a heads up the goats are very cheeky sometimes they love people and absolutely want to be the first to get to the oats 😆 so there's a lot of arguing and bickering between them they will push each other out of the way to get to you first!!they are very very human orientated and aren't mean but with younger children you have to be careful of little fingers ❤️ keira the horseis very laid back the cows are absolutely handsome well worth a visit!!you can purchase oats for the animals in the office £1.00 a bag I think but can't remember off hand my son has a large party bag that he likes to fill to the brim 😆 🤣 (all the animals have to get"their fair share")he often will share with the younger children the staff are always on hand to answer questions you can visit the farm and go into the cafe sometimes if it's busy as it's small you may have to pass round a couple of times to see all the animals there one of my sons...