The Farm Behind The Glitz
The Farm Behind the Glitz
The opulent 250-room Biltmore, in Asheville, N.C., is most famous as the largest private home in U.S. history. Finished in 1895 by shipping and railroad heir George W. Vanderbilt, it’s less appreciated as a working farm designed to be a self-sufficient island in what was then a remote mountain community (visit www.biltmore.com).
“I always tell people it was probably of necessity they wanted to raise their own food because there wasn’t a whole heck of a lot outside the front gate,” says Ted Katsigianis, Biltmore’s vice president for agriculture and environmental sciences. An animal scientist by trade, Katsigianis first came to work at Biltmore 30 years ago at the behest of William A.V. Cecil, George Vanderbilt’s grandson.
The estate, which is still privately owned by Vanderbilt heirs and is now one of the country’s top tourist attractions, sold off its dairy herd and ended its longtime “Biltmore Dairy Farms” brand in 1982.
That move didn’t mean the heirs wanted to develop the land in ways a typical tourist attraction might. “We wanted to replace dairy animals with grazing livestock,” Katsigianis says. “This landscape is not a golf course, it’s farm and forest.”
Modern Marvels. The estate remains true to George Vanderbilt’s original desire to create “a self-sustaining entity that thrives on the bounty of the land.” The operation is still diverse agriculturally, balancing an appreciation for showcasing the history of the property—with some modern twists.
In 2013, the estate began to make biodiesel using canola grown on the property and waste cooking oil produced by four of Biltmore’s restaurants. The B20 diesel fuel is used in most of the pickups and all of the diesel farm machinery there year-round—more than 100 pieces (see Oil Boom on page 54).
That’s not the only nod to the 21st century. On a remote hilltop away from tourists, 7,000 solar panels on 9 acres generate electricity amid grazing sheep. Nearly 20% of the electricity used at Biltmore is offset by energy created here.
The Biltmore of today is considerably smaller than the 125,000 acres Vanderbilt amassed during his life. When he died in 1914 at the age of 52, his widow, Edith, realized the costs of maintaining such a large house—and estate—were not viable long-term. She sold about 86,000 acres to the federal government for preservation to create the first national forest, Pisgah National Forest. This was the first, and biggest, of several sales that took the estate down to its current size.
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George and Edith’s heirs opened sections of the house (there is an indoor pool and bowling alley in the basement) to tourists beginning in 1930, while members of the family still lived in other areas into the 1950s.
Biltmore Estate now totals 8,000 acres: 5,200 acres in managed forest, 1,000 acres in pasture, 250 acres in row crops, 205 acres in forage crops, 15 acres in vegetable and berry production, and 75 acres in wine grapes. The balance of the land is in farmsteads, ponds, rivers, corrals, farm buildings, gardens and the Biltmore House itself. The more than 1 million tourists who stroll through the house and grounds each year spill over into Biltmore Winery, making it the most visited winery in the U.S.
Rural Roots. In many respects, the estate has returned to its roots. By the mid-1970s, only the dairy was still operating. In George Vanderbilt’s time, a small army of workers grew produce and other crops in addition to raising hogs, poultry and cattle while tending to scores of horses and mules used for work and pleasure.
Today, Biltmore is home to a noted 700-head herd of Registered Angus cattle. Breeding bulls and cows are sold to registered and commercial herds across the Southeast. The herd is also certified humane by the Global Animal Partnership, with no hormones or antibiotics used on steers raised for meat at Biltmore restaurants.
Nearly 800 head of White Dorper sheep are pastured at Biltmore, with lambs used in the estate’s restaurants while breeding females are sold throughout the Southeast. A large flock of free-range heirloom breed hens and chickens producing brown eggs are shuttled about the pastures in portable coops.
There are also more than 100 horses on the estate for carriage and trail rides, as well as riding lessons. The estate also operates a horse-boarding business.
“Prior to Biltmore, most of this land had been clear-cut, and there wasn’t any forestry management, per se,” Katsigianis says. “Most of the grounds have shallow soils and rough topography.”
Frederick Law Olmsted, who designed New York City’s famed Central Park, was hired to design Biltmore’s grounds and gardens. Gifford Pinchot and Carl Schenck managed the forests. Schenck established the first forestry program in the U.S., the Biltmore Forest School, on the estate in 1898.
Many of Biltmore’s old buildings have been reused and renovated. Biltmore Winery is now housed in the converted 1890s dairy barn. Nearby, in the estate’s Antler Hill Village, another barn has become a space for presentations to school groups.
“We are/were a Gilded Age upper class estate, and you still see that when you come here,” Katsigianis says. â¦�
Oil Boom:
Tucked back into Biltmore Estate’s thousands of acres is a 100-plus-year-old barn with a new, small grain bin attached. Inside, the barn has been renovated to process oil into biodiesel fuel. The fuel is made using oil from 50 acres of canola grown here in addition to waste oil collected from four of the Biltmore’s restaurants.
“As a company, we probably burn 28,000 gallons of diesel fuel annually,” says Tripp Hudgins, an engineering services technician who oversees biodiesel production. “We’re on track to process [some] 10,000 gallons annually ourselves.”
More than 100 vehicles and tractors here are fueled with B20, a diesel fuel containing 20% biodiesel. One pickup operates using 100% biodiesel.
A U.S.-made BioPro 380 inside the barn is capable of processing about 100 gallons of vegetable oil every 32 hours—if the process ran 24/7, which it doesn’t. Hudgins says they need to produce between 200 and 300 gallons per week to meet the estate’s demands.
Every 100 to 102 gallons of canola oil processed produces 95 to 97 gallons of biodiesel, Hudgins explains.
Fifty acres of canola grown on the estate yield about 50 bushels per acre, and that seed can be converted into 2,500 gallons of pure canola oil (50-gallon-per-acre yield). About 8,000 gallons of waste oil (canola oil) is collected from the restaurants.
This is only the second year canola has been grown on the estate. The crop will be rotated annually on one of four 50-acre fields. Generally, the plantings have been situated so visitors are treated to an eyeful of canola’s bright yellow blooms in early summer.
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