Traced Elements

Author: Michelle Beks

Lettuce Talk

There has been a small uproar on social media lately regarding the price in the local stores of lettuce. Small, wilted stuff that you know has traveled a few thousand miles to get here.

People are saying it is because of the romaine shortage.

But really, it is just an excuse the middle man and the stores are using to falsely inflate the price.

The only lettuce that should cost more because of the romaine shortage is romaine. Is any of that inflated cost trickling down to the romaine grower who now has to dump tons of lettuce? Doubt it.

In the seed potato industry, when there is a shortage of one variety of potato, it is only that one variety that costs a little more, because it is in demand.

I don’t buy lettuce in the winter. Salads are a summer thing.

Photo by Skitterphoto on Pexels.com

One more thing. You know that steak or hamburger you bought for your dinner? The price of that has steadily increased over the last few decades. We just shipped our beef cattle and averaged $1.80/lb. Now back up 40 years and those same cattle would have fetched us $1.00/lb. That’s is only an .80 cent or 80% increase in 40 years. Forty years, people! While the cost to produce that beef or the potatoes and vegetables that go with it has gone up 200% and the price you pay for that beef in the store has increased 170%.

Photo by Lukas on Pexels.com

I guess all I’m trying to say is all these price increases are not really getting back down the line to the producer of the food.

People, speak up with your wallets. Buy local. Eat seasonal.

December 7, 2018
Small Potatoes

Pemberton is nicknamed Spud Valley for good reason. Potatoes are the number one crop grown in the valley. The soil here is amazing for growing all kinds of vegetables but potatoes especially love it. The families who immigrated from Ireland and settled here in the early 1900’s saw this and started to grow potatoes. Thus the legend of the Pemberton potato was born.

Fast forward to today. There are 9 farms in the valley growing Elite Seed Potatoes. It takes us 3 or 4 years to get a crop that we will sell and ship off our farm. We grow our potatoes strictly to sell for seed to other potato growers who then may plant them for 1 or 2 more years before they end up in a store and on your plate.

The first year starts with what we call tissue culture plants. These are basically potato plant stem cuttings produced in a plant propagation facility that is co operatively run buy the farmers. Thousands of these plants are produced and planted in the field or in a screen house.

Our operation runs a screen house. This small house will produce enough potatoes to plant 40 or 50 acres in 3 years. These plants are amazing! Whenever I plant them I just can’t believe that these tiny fragile cuttings are going to grow into anything. Watered and cared for all summer long and they do it. They grow into beautiful big potato plants that produce tiny little tubers that will then become the base of our seed crop which we will sell in 4 years.

The potatoes that we harvest from our screen house are called mini tubers. Tiny little potatoes that we harvest, in the fall, by hand and store for the winter, planting them the following spring. They will be harvested and planted 3 more times. And so begins the circle of life for the famous Pemberton Potato.

August 19, 2018
If It Ain’t Broke It Will Be

Farming is not for the faint of heart.

Oh sure, as you drive up the valley and see all those beautiful farms, crops growing, people happily hoeing, tractors making the rounds, it all seem so peaceful and idyllic.

There is a behind the scenes though.

All that machinery and the tractors that pull it can pose a mechanical nightmare for farmers. They will most likely blow a gasket when you need them the most. Farming is an occupation that consists of a lot of frustration tempered with an equal amount of patience. There are times, I’m sure, when all of us have wanted to burn it all down.(Metaphorically speaking of course).

What can go wrong will go wrong. That seems to be the motto here at Shaw Creek Farms these days. Spring has sprung, summer is almost upon us and we have been faced with one mechanical disaster after another this spring.

First it was the tractor. A behemoth of a machine. Needed for damn near every job on the farm. The doohickey that connects the whatsit to the thingamabob broke. That is about as technical as I get. When my husband talks to me about tractor parts I know I should be paying close attention but all I really hear is the teacher’s voice from Charlie Brown. After numerous calls to the John Deere dealer the doohickey was ordered and picked up, in Kamloops, by my son and me.

The rotavator was the next to go. We had two fields left to till when smoke started pouring out of it. Never a good sign. The parts for this machine are so expensive they will be referred to in this paragraph by $$$$. Another call in to a different dealer followed by emails with photos and the $$$$ was ordered. We have to wait two weeks because, apparently these $$$$ have to come from the ends of the earth.

Next up, the fertilizer spreader. The thingy that wings the fertilizer out onto the ground disintegrated. Need a new one. Call in to John Deere again who then has to call Vicon, maker of said spreader. They then send it to John Deere, who then sends it to us. Thingy picked up and put back on. Spreader winging fertilizer again. But wait… not an hour later and here comes the tractor, backing the spreader into the shop. I know my husband is at the end of his rope because when I ask what’s wrong he silently points to the arm thingy that spins the wingy thingy. Off it comes and into the truck with it he goes. He’s not even calling the dealers now. He’s just heading straight to a neighbour’s farm to see what he’s got. Nope, the one the neighbour has is the wrong one. BUT WAIT. Up on the wall of the neighbour’s shop! There it is, hanging there. The part he needs! Praise be to Thor, God of tractor parts! (It’s got to be him right? He does carry a hammer.)

I really hope our run of bad luck is at an end.( I didn’t even mention the tractor tire that was one lug nut from falling off.) They say bad luck runs in threes. Ours just happen to be multiples of three. We’ll get there, the potatoes will get planted and they will be up out of the ground. Then this ‘springus horriblus’ will be but a memory.

In the meantime… patience.

*Michelle Beks is having a hard time getting anything done with her fingers crossed.

June 19, 2018
First Steps

Calving time on the farm is almost over. It starts in late January and finishes up around now. We have a small herd and have six new additions to the group. All born healthy and with no problems.

I was lucky to be there when this little one was born on a beautiful sunny day. I ran to get my camera and recorded her first steps.

Mama is licking her clean to dry her off. This is an important first step for Mama as it helps to imprint her calf to her. Within a few hours this little one will be trying to run and play with the other babes.

Feature photo courtesy Connie Sobchak. via TheWellnessAlmanac.com

April 19, 2018
Dreams of Chicken Soup

I just got over a wicked flu. Flat out for pretty much three weeks. One night as I was trying to get some sleep, in between coughing up a lung and blowing my nose, I could not get Chicken Soup out of my mind. I was visualizing me putting the whole chicken in a large pot of water, simmering it all day. I think I could even smell it! I could not stop thinking about it.

The next morning I dragged my sick, sorry butt out of bed and tromped straight across the yard to the barn where my freezer lives. I pulled out one of Nicole Ronayne’s amazing chickens and threw it in a pot with the last of my onions from my garden, carrots, celery and a boat load of garlic! Even just the smell of it simmering made me feel better. It was loaded with all the goodness that my sick body needed and I could not get enough of it. Breakfast, lunch, snacks and dinner until it was gone. It’s just so funny how our body knows just what it needs. Soups and stews along with gallons of hot teas. Warming our bodies from the inside out. Fighting those nasty bugs.

Our Mom’s and Grandma’s knew what they were doing. Food can heal whether it’s our bodies or our soul. Food does much more than just feed us. It can comfort and nurture as well. Food and wellness go hand in hand as well as food and sickness.

March 17, 2018