Sugar Plum Farms

Our take

Sugar Plum Farms has been family-owned since 1967, growing Fraser fir at elevation in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Plumtree. That’s a long operating history in an area full of established farms, and it’s paired here with an unusually clear set of weekly hours: Monday through Friday, 12:30pm to 5pm, and Saturday and Sunday, 9am until dark. Few farms in this batch publish weekday hours this specifically, which is genuinely useful if you’re trying to work a visit around a workweek schedule.

What’s notably absent is any mention of activities. No hayride, hot cocoa, Christmas shop, or Santa visit appears in the record. That’s not a flaw so much as a different kind of farm: this reads as a straightforward, business-like tree-buying operation rather than a family-outing destination. If a fast, no-frills tree pickup is what you want, that’s arguably a point in its favor rather than against it.

A second reason to visit

Sugar Plum also runs a year-round retail nursery on the same property, open Monday through Saturday, 9am to 5pm, selling native plants, ornamentals, and perennials. That’s a genuine bonus if you garden or landscape and want to combine a Christmas tree trip with browsing plant stock, something most single-purpose choose-and-cut farms in this area don’t offer.

Group and wholesale options

The record notes that group visits and wholesale inquiries are available on request, which is worth knowing if you’re coordinating a larger purchase, say for an organization or multiple households, rather than a single family tree.

What’s missing

No season dates were confirmed for 2026; a previous listing showed Nov. 14 through Dec. 20, but that was tied to the prior season and not confirmed to repeat. No pricing is published either. Given the farm’s straightforward, business-oriented presentation, calling ahead to confirm both isn’t an unreasonable extra step, it fits the practical character of the operation, and it’s the only honest way to get a number before you drive out.

Weighing a no-activities farm against a family-outing farm

If you’re comparing this listing against other High Country farms with hayrides, Christmas shops, or Santa visits, it’s worth being honest with yourself about what you actually want from the trip. A farm with fewer amenities isn’t necessarily worse; it can mean less time spent waiting in line for a hayride or navigating a crowded shop, and more time spent simply picking a good tree. For visitors who find the festival-like atmosphere of a bigger farm more stressful than fun, especially with young kids in tow, a straightforward operation like this one may actually be the easier visit.

The weekday window worth considering

Because weekday hours here start at 12:30pm rather than early morning, a weekday visit pairs naturally with a late-morning errand elsewhere in the area, followed by a tree pickup on the way through. That’s a small logistical note, but for anyone trying to fit a tree run into an otherwise busy day rather than dedicating a full weekend morning to it, the later weekday start could work in your favor.