Keeping our farmland healthy and thriving
Our Farming Practices
We are a conventional farm that incorporates many beneficial farming practices to take care of our family home. We believe healthy and nutritious crops come from healthy soils. We know that the extra care we take into nurturing our soils now will help them continue to be fruitful in the future. By combining the following strategies, we aim to provide good quality crops, maintain and support natural habitats for biodiversity, and foster the land for the generations to come.
Cover Crops
A cover crop is grown on a field not with the interest of harvesting for profit. Their purpose is to select a crop that will add specific nutrients back into the soil in between growing seasons. They can also help with lessening compaction, improve drainage, improve biological activity, prevent soil erosion, and can suppress weeds.
Integrated Pest Management
We follow a comprehensive approach to pest control on the farm that focuses on monitoring our fields and identifying damage thresholds. We use cultural, physical, and biological controls and as a last resort, chemical controls. We follow the recommendations and guidelines set on the Ontario Crop Protection Hub.
Crop Rotation
Depending on the crop’s lifecycle, some have to be replanted every year (annual) or every 2-3 years in terms of strawberries. When it is time to plant a new field on our farm, we avoid planting the same crop in the same field back to back years. Crop rotation is beneficial to the soil and gives it opportunity to get different nutrients and biological activity in the soil. It also prevents the population buildup of weeds, disease and insects. Typically, crops from the same family are hosts to the same pests, planting the field to an alternate family can decrease the population of those pests.
Renewable Energy
The farm has two wind turbines and two solar generation units. Solar and wind energy are renewable and abundant resources. The idea of harnessing cleaner energy sources on the farm was exciting to us.
Soil Health
Investing in our soil’s health on our farm is important not only for the crops we are growing now but for the future generations that might farm on this land. It takes many years to buildup soil health by using many beneficial farming practices. We get our soil sampled and tested in lab every year, we have a soil analyst that provides recommendations for amendments
Woodlot Management
20% of our farmland is Carolinian forest. Forested areas are essential to maintain biodiversity and provide habitats for many species. It is important to us to keep our woodlot healthy for many years to come. In 2018, we planted 5 more acres of marginal farmland into forest and ground cover.