Farmers DO Feed Cities

Farmers do feed cities... Many people have lost that connection with their food, how it is produced and what it really means. Food is much more that sustenance for the body. It feeds the soul.

Food is very intimate. Yet today many allow the "walmartization" (the movement toward lowest common denominator) of the food that they eat and the food they feed their families. Food today is often overly processed, removing the nutrients, the intimate experience and sometimes the taste. People want cheaper foods but often these foods come at a greater cost. Often these processed foods have higher fat or sugar levels. While there is nothing wrong with fat or sugar, when they are substitutes for the taste and feel we get real food, it does us no good. If you don't already... try reading the label before you buy... informative and maybe a bit scary.

Farmers Feed Cities! is about people reconnecting with rural life, farms and farm families... reconnecting with food... REAL FOOD... food that is safe, reliable, and tastes great.

If city folk don't reconnect with Rural Ontario... continue to allow the destruction of some of the greatest farmland in the world... Seek out the lowest common denominator... do not support Ontario farmers and we produce... city folk may have problems getting food...

Globalization of food, food production hurts Ontario farmers. We do not pay the real cost of food. Why does an apple from New Zealand cost less than an Ontario apple? It must cross an ocean to get here with all the energy use that entails. The Ontario apple could come from just 100 km away. Much less energy is used. Much less carbon is put into the atmosphere.

Something to think about. Try buying locally. Foodland Ontario has all sorts of information on ways to buy and eat Ontario food.

New Interchange

Sometime in late summer we should have a new interchange at Hwy 400 and Iroquois Cranberry Growers Drive. This will make access to the bog easier and safer for our visitors and for the transports that come in to pick up cranberries during harvest. The new exit will be 182. This section will have service roads along the west side of 400 between our exit and Twelve Mile Bay Road.

What do we do in the winter?

There is always lots to do in the winter... this year we are widening the road into the bog... it is amazing how fast the trees grow back in... nature is resilient... To get tractor-trailers into the farm during harvest it needs to be wide and dry...


We also must keep the snow off the fields and the dikes. We have not had much snow this year. If the field has more than 30 cm of snow we must blow it off onto the dikes. The ring dikes must be clear of snow so we can get around the bog. We flood the fields too. When the temperature falls and the ground starts to freeze, we flood the fields. The water freezes and forms a layer of ice on the fields. We deflood after a week as longer would damage the plants. The ice settles on the vine protecting it from the cold and desiccation.











We also welcome visitors at the bog... of course we see customers at the store.... but we see wildlife too. Lots of birds are in the uplands around the bog. Sometimes we have bigger visitors... over the weekend we had Moose on the bog. They walked all over... even between buildings... from the tracks there were four moose. We often see their tracks but rarely see them... during the 2006 harvest, staff doing flooding at night saw two under a light at a pumphouse.