Red Deer Advocate - Asparagus harvesters

Check out the Red Deer Advocate newspapers video of our festival this last weekend

Red Deer Advocate - Asparagus harvesters

River Cafe and off to the Airport

Our daughter Angela was home for the last few days. She and her husband Steve drove down to Edmonton where we picked her last Sunday.

She was to fly back home on Thursday evening when out of nowhere we had a violent spring snow storm. They closed the highway to the airport that evening so she had to reschedule her flight for Friday. We drove to Calgary Friday and saw her off just outside of the security doors. We hadn't even got back to the highway when she called on the cell phone to say her flight was canceled because the plane wouldn't be able to land in Fort McMurray. She then booked a flight on the next available plane on Sunday afternoon.

It was unfortunate she missed her flights as she missed both her baby doctor specialist appointment and the start of her pre-natal course. It will be another 2 weeks before she can reschedule her doctors appointment so she has to go back to her regular doctor for her checkup.

On the plus side we had time to go to River Cafe for lunch before going to the airport on Sunday. This is by far our favorite restaurant in Calgary. For anyone that hasn't been to River Cafe it's a great place that actually cooks your food not just reheating processed food like a lot of the places do. The service is great, the staff all enjoy your company and really make you feel welcome. It was the first time for Angie at River Cafe. She has travelled a lot all over the world in her 30 plus years but had never seen a waiter come and refold my cloth napkin when I went to the washroom. She commented on how great the food tasted, how clean and shinny the glasses were and all the other little things that they do. It's so nice that when you taste your food it actually has flavor, along with the excellent presentation and ambiance.

We then dropped Angie off at the airport and drove home. Once we got home Angie phoned from the Fort McMurray airport letting us know she arrived safely.

Learning how to make buns

Today was bun making day at our house. Grandma Huntly is definitely an expert at this and both of our daughters wanted to learn this art. At about 9:00 AM Grandma and showed up with all her ingredients to make buns. She has to have her own special four, vegetable oil. She did use our cookie sheets but she did comment that they weren't as good as hers (and not as old either).

Making buns is an all day affair, Shortly after arriving she started organizing her ingredients. Angie was the head note taker and took two pages of notes to share with her sister and mother.

One of the big challenges was getting the measurements of all the ingredients as Grandma doesn't measure, she just pours and mixes. During the day they had to stop Grandma and get her to measure each ingredient and then document it and make a real recipe.

After all this at at about 4:00 pm the first batch was ready and I had to be on hand for the taste testing. Of course they we just as good as always.

We had fresh buns for Angie's birthday supper along with all the other great food.

Getting Ready for Spring

With the warmer weather lately we have been able to work out side and get some maintenance done for spring. Several years ago I built a machine to drag across the hay fields to level out the humps and bumps caused by moles, a small rodent that lives in the fields. This machine has worked very well, but has become worn quite badly. Last Friday my nephew Kyle a journeyman welder was out to weld new plates on the bottom of this machine. Pictured here is Kyle in the middle of welding the plates on. Also while he was doing that outside I was in the shop working on welding on a hitch on our manure spreader.

Working the Fields

Today I was discing the field where some of our garden peas will be planted this year. I disced the field twice with the tractor used for our grain farming and then Elna was out in the afternoon with her seed drill planting peas.

Discing is not practice that we do on our grain farm. With the advances in seeding equipment we direct seed most all of our field crops. For the garden peas discing warms the soil and will help kill the weeds in the garden.

This is the second planting of the season as we planted on row last November 8 just to see if fall planting of peas would work. So far they look good but it is still too cold for them to germinate.

In the afternoon I harrowed the other field where our garden peas will be planted this year. This field can be quite wet some years, but this year it very dry meaning we are about a month earlier getting on the field compared to normal. Not good as we need moisture!!

Calving Season is here.

March is when we like to calve our cows. We actually start about the 20th of February and finish hopefully before the end of April. It seems that by March the weather is starting to warm up, but the mud puddles haven't got too big yet.

We have to spend a lot of time in the pen with our cows, just checking on things and being there if there are any issues. The cows get quite used to us being around and after a wile almost ignore us as we walk through the pen. They do seem annoyed when I walk through the pen at 3:00 am and shine the flashlight in their eyes.

The grand kids get quite used to being there when a new born calf opens his eyes for the first time, looks around in bewilderment and wonders what all those things are he is seeing for the first time. It seems an amazing act of mother nature to watch him learn to stand and learn to drink milk all in his first 15 minutes of his life.

The grand kids do enjoy going out to the barnyard for fresh air and to get out of the house. They do like to go feed the horses. Our old white horse named Blaze just had his 31st. birthday. In the picture you can see he is getting his mane braided.

Keri's Birthday

Keri celebrated another birthday the other day. We invited her and her family over for a family meal and celebration. We were also fortunate to have my sister Vicki and her husband come for supper and a visit. They only live about 30 minutes away but it seems we never get to see them so it was great to catch up on what was happening in their lives.

Farm Marketer of the Year

On February 24 and 25 we attended the Alberta Farm Fresh Producers Associations annual Berry and Vegetable school. It moves around throughout the province each year and we were fortunate that this year it was in Red Deer which is only an 1/2 drive away.

This is always a very informative couple of days with lots of great speakers all with a wealth of knowledge. We also like all the networking that happens in the classrooms and in the hallways with other growers from throughout the province.

Each year the executive of the association chooses one operation to be their "FARM MARKETER OF THE YEAR". This year Edgar Farms was chosen with this prestigious award. Jim Hill a grower from Sylvan Lake made the presentation at the noon luncheon. He spoke of what we had done on the farm and needless to say our heads got quite swollen from all the good things he said.

We received a lot of good press with this award with a large articles in the Red Deer, and Innisfail papers. We were also interviewed on the radio on the farm news section.

An email from Carlos in Chile

As you may know this last January we toured Chile. One of the memorable stops was at Carlos Crovettos farm. He was the fellow that treated everyone as his best friend and taught the no till school.

Last night we received a forwarded email from him. I have attached it below. He speaks of an earthen damn that he has for irrigation water and he has opened the underwater drain to lower the water level


Pictured here is a view of his irrigation lagoon and a picture of a building that had toppled over in Concepion that I copied from "The Hindu" magazine on line.

Dated March 03, 2010 11:03 PM.
Quoting Calos

"Dear Friends:

Since few minutes ago the cell and internet communication arrive.

My family, closer friends and myself are fine. We are in the fifth day but still we do not have electricity. In the farm we have had little damage. the main one looks to be 60 meters crack in the main dam but it does not have seepage we have open underground pipe for water release. Soon an engineer is coming to check damage.

We have electric generator to produce energy in vital service like, water, light energy for 70 thousand birds, mash food, communication through satellite with CNN and national at Santiago TV.

Our apartment in Concepcion is 3 years old, fortunatelyr Saturday early morning 3.30 hours we were not in there, we were at the farm. The building has 13 floor. Monday we could enter, the building is severe damaged inside the twin towers is 25 cm lay down ay the level of our floor, has to be demolished as well as many others. In Concepcion one new one fall down with 15 floors. Rescue came from Santiago, many people is death, they have to open concret walls with electric machine to get in and rescue some alive people. This is unbelievable, how could fall down,maybe the question is why remain stand up many others tall buildings?

The earhtquake was 8.8 Ritcher scale and last more than two minutes. Unbelievable, Never feel in Chile something like that. I remember the 1939 earthquake, I was six fortunately our house was very solid concret. This one killed 10.00 people. Most of the houses were adobe brick. To day the situation is completely different. During the movement I thought that was the end of our life, every furniture was move about three meters, some fall down, many windows were broken.

Right now we have a big one............... we have had more than one hundred. Doris panic is out of control. I do not know what to do.

In Concepcion bad people is destroying every thing, some looking for something to eat and water, but many of them are taking out every thing from the super markets malls and others.. Fortunately since yesterday the army close to the police are working for better citizen control.

The central south of our country is paralyzed, the people is suffering, no food and water, oil is difficult to get. We can not send eggs to Concepcion and we are in severe danger in the farm. We have locked the two access road to the farm.

When we receive your emails we feel much better. We have had more than 120 earthquake and only today the internet is open. We loved your messagge, it is wonderfulto have we have good friends that really love us is Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, Uruguay, USA, Canada, Ukraine, Germany, England, Spain, Australia, Canada, Mexico and France.

I would like to know better English and tell and explain in a better way every thing about us. Please receive everyone of your warmest appreciation for your worries about us. It is a great help for our life.

Carlos Crovetto Doris Arrau"

Off to see Angie in Fort Mac.

This weekend some of our family flew out of Edmonton to see our daughter Angie and her husband Steve.

Angie is due to have her first baby this May so Elna has been missing not being closer to her, although I am sure when the big day comes she will up there in a flash.

Their was no school on Friday so Elna and her 2 granddaughters and their mother all went to see Angie and Steve. Randy and I stayed home to look after things on the farm. This was not the first time any of them had flown but while waiting to board the plane when they announce that families with small children could board first they did. They were really impressed when the Air Canada pilot saw them coming across the tarmac and with the flight attendant taking their picture in front of the plane, he offered them his hat for the picture but Elna insisted that he be in the picture.

Argentina Cattle

Argentina is big into beef production. We had the opportunity to be at a beef producers place to watch him work some of his Red Angus cattle through the chute. He was applying an insecticide to cattle for the treatment of insects. After we were done we then went to his ranch house for a delicious meal and an after lunch rest in a shady hammock.

We also toured the largest cattle auction in Argentina. The day we were there they were selling 270 kg. grass fattened steers ready for slaughter. They slaughter their animals a lot smaller than we do because of the lack of feed and if they grew them out to full size you would not be able to chew the meat. Our calves are heavier than that in the fall when we wean them from the cow and then we feed them to a market weight of 500-600 kg. Because we give our cattle lots of good feed they grow faster and are more tender.

We also visited a leather coat factory that made real nice custom leather coats. Elna and her friend Evelyn both bought new jackets. We stopped at the factory at about 6:30 Saturday eve. at which time they measured everyone purchasing jackets. At 2:00 pm. Monday afternoon they arrived a our hotel with about 25 new hand made jackets custom fit for people on our tour. Considering that they don't work on Sunday and that we were not the only group buying coats that evening that seemed to be an impressive feat. Shelley also ordered one but they got the measurements wrong and immediately refunded her money back to her. If it wasn't that we were heading off to the airport in about an hour they would of just made her a new one that same day.

Argentina Soybeans

Soybeans are the biggest field crop in Argentina. One of reasons for this is the Argentinian government has a "cheap food policy" and politically forces down the price of any crop grown for human or cattle feed. This means if they grow wheat they don't get paid much, probably near or below the cost of production.

Soybeans are an export crop so they are sold on the Chicago Stock exchange at the world price. The government does tax the farmer 35% of his crop before regular taxes. Even so they still grow soybeans. These beans are all GMO soybeans and also require fewer crop inputs than other crops. This cheap food policy is why they have no feed for their cattle as they can't make money growing feed grain.

The downside with this whole program is it skews the supply and demand cycle and even though there is demand for wheat hardly anyone grows wheat.

Also they ending up flooding the world market with cheap soybeans especially during their harvest period when all the farmers are selling as they need the money.