TIFTON — Fall is here and there are a lot of fun activities occurring at Rutland Farms.

Meredith Rutland said Rutland Farms, a family operation, is an agritourism venue. She said it started out as a family farm and is now operated by the fifth generation. Her father-in-law is the fourth and her husband is fifth.

Rutland said during the past 15 years, they started doing agritourism, including field trips, tours and “U-Pick” opportunities.

“The fall field trips have sort of evolved into something that’s been even more of a draw than the spring,” she said.

She said people are enjoying the corn mazes, which have been in operation three years. She said it was something that her husband, Ryan, wanted to try out. They worked with the University of Georgia Tifton Campus to develop the mazes.

Rutland said Dr. George Vellidis has been huge in helping them with this. She said GPS equipment is used to create the mazes. They can take any design that you come up with and convert it into a maze.

“It’s really cool,” she said.

Rutland explained that the design is taken and put into the GPS system, and then Ryan and some of the UGA Tifton Campus students go through the maze and cut it in. She said their corn maze for this year is a tribute to Georgia’s head football coach, Mark Richt, who has been with UGA for 15 seasons. The corn maze will depict his face.

“We’re really proud of it,” Rutland said, commenting that the UGA Tifton Campus staff and students are great to work with.

She said they did a Georgia football helmet the first year, a tribute to Ryan’s late grandfather the second year and a tribute to Georgia Grown last year. She said they decided to go back to the football theme for this year. Both she and Ryan attended UGA, which is why Ryan likes working with the local students so much.

“He was once in their shoes, he knows their capability and wants to give back by providing experiential learning opportunities in agriculture whenever he can,” Rutland said.

Rutland Farms is located at 5641 Union Road in Tifton. The corn maze opens Monday and runs through Nov. 14. Hours of operation are from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Saturday. The price is $6 per person. The price will increase to $8 (which will include everything) during special events and the maze will remain open until 10 p.m.

To find out about more fall activities happening at the farm, visit their website at www.rutlandfarms.com.