Cultivating community
Kate Garvie is focused on building the food system she’d like to see in the future. | 12
Suppressing weeds with covers
Can roller crimping take off in Ontario? | 16
Regenerative agriculture legacy
B.C.’s Tea Creek is working towards a more resilient future. | 20
April 2023
April 2023 Vol.79, Issue 3
Silvopasture potential
Management is a key factor of this mixed ag practice, which can be a possible source of added income and regenerative agriculture benefits. Editorial 4
News 6
8
the weather in Atlantic Canada
Trends 10
Organic Perspective 14
Regenerative organic soil gets the best of both worlds
12 16 20
Cultivating community
Heartbeet Farm’s Kate Garvie knows the importance of community and sticking to values.
BY ALEX BARNARD
Suppressing weeds with covers Roller crimping is popular in the U.S. Can it take off in Ontario?
BY JULIENNE ISAACS
Tea Creek: Legacy of regenerative agriculture Rebuilding regenerative agriculture for a more resilient future.
BY KAILTIN PACKER
When it comes to growing high quality crops, Orondis® fungicide isn’t just another cog in the machine—it’s the gear that drives your disease control. With a uniquely powerful mode of action, Orondis provides unparalleled protection so you can pack and store with confidence.
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The governments of Canada and Ontario have negotiated a new, five-year agreement that will provide a range of investments to help improve productivity, competitiveness and resilience in the agriculture sector.
The Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership (Sustainable CAP) for Ontario that will see upwards of $1.77 billion in support for the agrifood sector over the life of the agreement. Through the Sustainable CAP, $569 million will be invested in strategic initiatives, which is a 25 per cent increase over the previous funding agreement. There will
also be roughly $1.2 billion for continued, demanddriven, business risk management (BRM) supports for farmers.
Sustainable CAP will also boost investments in research and innovation and other strategic areas to strengthen the sector. The agreement will include the launch of the new Resilient Agricultural Landscape Program (RALP), a funding initiative to mitigate climate change and support the agricultural sector in better addressing sustainability outcomes.
The Sustainable CAP starts on April 1 and replaces the Canadian Agricultural Partnership (CAP).
Farm & Food Care, a non-for-profit organization with a mandate to build public trust and confidence in food and farming, is launching a nation-wide farm photo contest with $4,000 in cash prizes available for winners in six categories. Winning photos may be used by the organization in the upcoming sixth edition of The Real Dirt on Farming , a publication that answers common questions about food and farming practices in Canada.
It can take more than 500 years to form two centimetres of topsoil
Soil stores 10 per cent of the world’s carbon dioxide
There are 10 orders of soil recognized in Canada
MORE THAN 500,000 EARTHWORMS CAN LIVE IN A HEALTHY ACRE OF SOIL
While earthworms have many benefits for agriculture, almost all earthworm species in Canada are non-native and can damage native forests
Photo contest categories include Canadian farm scenes, faces behind food and farming, farm innovation, and more.
Photos awarded first through third prize in each category will win a cash prize. As well, non-winning entries used in The Real Dirt on Farming booklet will receive $50 per photo.
It is estimated that over $3 billion in productivity is lost every year, mainly due to tillage, wind and water erosion
More information, including contest rules, eligibility, format, identification and judging are posted on the FFCO website at farmfoodcareon.org/ photo-contest.
A SOIL SCIENTIST WON THE 1952 NOBEL PRIZE IN PHYSIOLOGY OR MEDICINE FOR CURING TUBERCULOSIS
Streptomycin, the first antibiotic that killed the TB pathogen without also killing the patient, was isolated from Streptomyces cultures found in the soils near Rutgers University in New Jersey
Soil has about 100,000,000 bacteria and 1,000,000 fungi per teaspoon Statistics courtesy of CropLife Canada.
ABOVE Erosion on a field in Nova Scotia two days after hurricane Fiona, Sept. 25, 2022.
The consequences of changing precipitation regimes on soil conditions are numerous. What are some ways to mitigate them?
One of the many challenges the agriculture industry must face with climate change is the increase in frequency and severity of storms and changes in precipitation regimes. In the Atlantic region, spring and fall have been getting wetter and summer has been getting drier. It is making it increasingly difficult to manage water on-farm, and many producers are becoming more reliant on irrigation and artificial drainage.
many consequences to poor water management, and excess water in the spring and fall can result in the following:
• Compaction from heavy traffic results in compressed soil particles and reduced pore space. It restricts root depth and can impact plant growth. The use of heavy machinery or even foot traffic on your fields when wet can cause rutting and decrease productivity in the affected areas.
• Water erosion, in which soil sediment is moved and relocated. Soil erosion can remove topsoil resulting in the loss of the most fertile part of your soil. Rills and gullies occur due to soil erosion, and these areas cannot support healthy crop growth. In extreme cases, this can prevent the use of machinery.
BY CAITLIN McCAVOUR, PERENNIA
The changing precipitation patterns have altered the quantity of water available to farms and the timing at which water is available. There is a growing need to build soil resiliency to adapt to changes in weather patterns. There are
• Water runoff and leaching of plant-essential nutrients. Runoff occurs when water input from rainfall or other sources exceeds your soil infiltration rate. Nitrate is a plant-available form of nitrogen that is soluble in water, and can be leached (removed) from the soil through runoff.
Phosphates can bind to soil particles and be lost through erosion with increased runoff. This loss of nutrients can instigate nutrient deficiencies in your crop and may require greater amounts of fertilizer to compensate for the loss. In addition, phosphates and nitrates in runoff water can cause damage to adjacent ecosystems such as freshwater streams.
• Lower oxygen in soil pores and restriction of root growth and microbial activity. Warming temperatures increase microbial activity in the spring. Oxygen in the rooting zones allows for aeration, which dries the soil and helps increase soil temperature in the spring to promote seed germination. Water in the rooting zones for long periods can delay the planting season by delaying soil warming. If water remains in your field for long periods, inhibiting planting and plant growth, surface or subsurface drainage should be considered.
• Loss of soil nitrogen through denitrification. Denitrification is the conversion of nitrate and nitrite
to gaseous forms of nitrogen, like nitrous oxide. Denitrification increases when low oxygen in the soil results in nitrogen losses.
Lack of water in summer can result in the following:
• Reduced plant water uptake, resulting in drought symptoms. Irrigation may have to be considered if drought-like conditions frequently occur in your field.
• Decreased microbial activity results in decreased mineralization and lower nitrogen and phosphorus availability. Microbial activity in soil largely depends on soil moisture and soil temperature. Alterations to temperature and moisture through drought can alter soil organic matter decomposition.
• Decreased movement of nutrients through soil solution, resulting in lower nutrient uptake. Plant nutrient deficiencies often occur.
To avoid these consequences, it is important to increase water infiltration and water holding capacity. Controlling water on your farm can be difficult and expensive,
but soil organic matter is one of the most important tools for water management. Soil organic matter is reported on a soil test report, and taking soil samples is vital for soil management. Soil organic matter can often be thought of as a sponge; it can absorb water and slowly release it, helping to manage both lack of and excess water. Some practices which can help increase soil organic matter are:
• Using cover crops to promote plant rooting and help increase infiltration;
• Leaving crop residues on the field;
• Applying organic amendments such as compost and manure;
• Using a diverse crop rotation; and
• Reducing tillage.
Keep in mind that organic matter can take a long time to increase, and improvements in water dynamics may not occur immediately.
In the face of increased climate volatility, managing water on farms will become increasingly difficult. However, building soil resiliency through increased organic matter can help mitigate some of the risks of climate change.
Efficient and complete burndown of annual grasses and broadleaf weeds. When it comes to controlling weeds, you don’t have time to mess around. That’s why there’s Ignite® herbicide. It provides proven and complete burndown of annual grasses and broadleaf weeds within 7 to 10 days in a range of crops, including tree fruit, blueberries and grapes. And as an additional bonus, Ignite also prevents sucker growth. So what are you waiting for? Visit agsolutions.ca/horticulture today.
fruitandveggie.com
Unfold, a seed and digital solutions company in the vertical farming industry, and GoodLeaf Farms, Canada’s largest commercial vertical farm, have partnered to commercialize premium lines of vertically farmed spinach and other leafy greens through Unfold’s Innovation Partner Program.
“As a former vertical farm operator, I understand firsthand the importance of seeds that are specifically developed for indoor growing,” said Unfold CEO Sonia Lo. “Through our partnership, we will accelerate their product evolution with seed developed and optimized for their specific environment.”
GoodLeaf is currently building new facilities in Montreal and Calgary to expand upon its current production out of Guelph, Ont. With the completion of these two farms, GoodLeaf will produce over four million pounds of leafy greens annually; this is especially important for
Canada, where spinach, lettuce and other leafy greens remain amongst the country’s top imports. Both farms will be fully operational later this year.
Unfold’s Innovation Partner Program provides vertical farms access to the company’s plant biology expertise, digital tools and germplasm. This access is a competitive advantage for vertical farmers, who often lack proficiency in seed genetics and agronomics for indoor farming and, as a result, are left to rely on suboptimal seeds that generate reduced quality and yields.
Working together, the two companies aim to develop varieties of leafy greens that require less time and energy to produce while enhancing traits valued by consumers, like crunch, colour and taste. These new varieties will boost GoodLeaf’s produce output while lowering its production costs, allowing increased accessibility of fresh vegetables closer to consumers’ homes.
Freshbay Inc. has received a purchase agreement from Berrymobile Fruit Distribution Inc., one of Western Canada’s premium local soft fruit wholesalers, for 15 million pounds of strawberries annually.
Announced on Feb. 9, Freshbay will launch a large-scale, deep earth geothermal-powered, 19-acre controlledenvironment agriculture (CEA) facility, expected to begin operations in Hinton, Alta., in January 2024. The project will use cutting-edge vertical farming technologies, greenhouses, and scientific horticulture procedures to create 100 per cent sustainable operations to grow herbs, strawberries and tropical fruits year-round in remote regions. Freshbay is set to provide a major
boost to the local economy, specifically by creating a projected 450 new full-time jobs.
This first of its kind project uses heat from geothermal wells and cogeneration to directly heat, power and supplement CO2 -enriched air for over 800,000 square feet of new Atlantis greenhouses outfitted with Affinor Growers Inc.’s turnkey vertical farming technology.
The sales agreement for the strawberries is produced under the Affinor Growers’ Grade A brand “Affinoria Fragaria.” The strawberries were market-tested for quality and shelf life in Vancouver over the winter of 2022, and distributed by Berrymobile to excess demand.
British Columbia’s farmers and food and beverage producers and processors will soon have more opportunities to grow their businesses while helping strengthen food security with the development of a new food hub in Summerland.
In partnership with the District of Summerland and Community Futures Okanagan Similkameen, the Government of B.C. is investing $800,000 over two years in a new Okanagan Food and Innovation Hub (OFIH) in Summerland and growing the B.C. Food Hub Network to 13 facilities throughout the province. The hub will be located in the District of Summerland and will open in summer 2024.
“The development of the Okanagan Food and Innovation Hub will provide a catalyst for development of
innovative and new ideas by providing access to top-of-the-line equipment and a creative space to nurture the growth of local companies,” said Roly Russell, parliamentary secretary for rural development.
“This is the kind of project that helps build more resilience into rural community economies while strengthening food security for all British Columbians.”
Food hubs provide a commercial, shared food-processing and innovation space which help increase the volume of food grown and processed locally. This creates more demand for ingredients from local farmers and increases the number of people employed locally by the food industry while addressing food safety and security issues.
Heartbeet Farm’s Kate Garvie highlights the importance of community and values-based decision-making on her farm.
BY ALEX BARNARD
Kate Garvie proves you don’t have to be born into it to make a home in Canadian agriculture – or develop a budding sweet potato empire.
Garvie came to farming through her environmental studies degree at Trent University in Peterborough, Ont. Each semester, students participating in the university’s sustainable agriculture courses would visit four to six farms.
“I really fell in love with the farms and what they were doing, and the actual people who were farming were just really genuine, kind people,” she says.
This led her to Guelph and a CRAFT Ontario Farming Internship on a new farm, where she confirmed that farming was what she wanted to do. After obtaining a graduate degree in environmental studies and working for a few years on a central Ontario farm, Garvie moved north to Ottawa.
“I had been working for my friend [on a farm] and it was quite rural,” she says. “I decided that I wanted to have more of a community.”
Through her work on food security with a nonprofit, she connected with Katie Ward, a livestock farmer and multi-term president of the National
ABOVE
Farmers Union (NFU), who offered Garvie the use of some land.
“It was an easy decision. I knew I wanted to get back into farming and [Ward] had a one-acre market garden that she had been running and then decided to take a step back from,” Garvie says. “So, it was a really easy transition.”
With that land, she started Heartbeet Farm, an organic community-supported agriculture (CSA) farm, in 2018. That same year, she met future farm partner David Mazur-Goulet when she was renting greenhouse space to grow her seedlings at his farming co-operative, The BeetBox.
“We both had our farm names before we met, and they just happened to both include ‘beet,’” she laughs.
Now, Garvie and Mazur-Goulet work together on Heartbeet Farm, where they grow roughly 40 different types of vegetables and 12 varieties of sweet potato, with plans to keep expanding those numbers and their customer base.
“It’s nice to see old customers and bring new people into eating seasonally,” Garvie says. “People are so excited about vegetables they’ve never seen before and they get jazzed about kohlrabi.”
Kate Garvie hoists a sweet potato grown through her farm’s short-season trials.
Garvie says she and Mazur-Goulet are values-driven when it comes to making decisions, both on and off the farm.
“Farming is a political act, but it’s also one way that we can have a really positive impact and look at what we’d like the future of the food system to look like. That’s what we’re focused on,” she explains.
“I worked as a student as an activist fighting against a lot of what’s going on, like about climate change, and that was really exhausting to me. Farming is a more positive way of contributing, I think.”
The challenge, she says, is to make decisions that keep their farm profitable and sustainable while having a positive impact on the community and allowing for collaboration with other farmers.
After first getting involved through Ward, Garvie spent time as president of local 362 of the NFU while farming in Kanata, where she put these values into play in the broader farming community.
“Once you join [the NFU], you’re meeting so many like-minded farmers. It’s really policy-driven and fighting for smaller scale farms,” she says, adding that NFU meetings are marked by spirited but respectful debate. “It’s also a larger mix of farmers, [including] conventional farmers as well. I think it’s nice to maintain those connections to all different types of farming.”
Some may know Garvie for her work trialling sweet potato varieties suited for the Ottawa region’s shorter season. She and Telsing Andrews, who was working on plant breeding, “decided to apply for a grant to look at food security in the region and high calorie crops that are good storage crops so we would have more food
security in the winter months.”
Andrews ran a farm called Aster Lane Edibles and volunteered at the non-profit Garvie worked at. When she moved on from the project, Garvie found herself with 60 potential new varieties of sweet potato grown from true seed and a lack of plant-breeding experience.
“I immediately reached out to the Farmer-Led Research branch of EFAO (Ecological Farmers Association of Ontario),” Garvie says. “Rebecca Ivanoff is amazing – she was super supportive and helped me plan out the project. She even came and helped me harvest some of the sweet potatoes and do the data collection.”
Garvie continues to run sweet potato trials and has begun selling sweet potato slips through her farm.
“It’s really exciting. When you grow out true seed, you don’t know what it’s going to look like – it could be a totally different-looking sweet potato. It’s kind of like a little treasure hunt,” she says.
“It’s a very different relationship to the vegetables than you have when you’ve pre-sold them and you need to select the best varieties for reliability.”
Her favourite variety that she’s helped to develop is called Magenta, which has uniquely shaped leaves and shorter vines, making it suited for smaller spaces or intensive farming. The skin is a bright purple, while the interior flesh is white and purple and occasionally includes specks of orange.
“I’m hoping to select more for that [in the future], but it needs to look nice when it’s cooked – because right now, it’s not that pretty,” Garvie laughs.
“People are really excited about growing [sweet potatoes]. They like the idea of trialling something that is brand new and selected for this region.”
As for what’s next, Garvie says she’s keen to dig into a new area and keep growing.
She and Mazur-Goulet moved their farm to a more rural location –25 minutes south of Kemptville, 25 minutes north of Brockville – in July 2021, so they’re working to learn the property and expand their CSA into the local area.
“Because we’re brand new on this farm and it hadn’t been a market garden before, we want to get to know the land better and build up organic matter in the soil – and build the soil, since it’s lacking right now – and increase biodiversity on the farm.”
Garvie is delighted by the sense of community they’ve already found around their new farm. “We’re really lucky that we moved into an area where a few other young farmers are farming, and the farmers on our road are super supportive,” she says. “We hadn’t bought our tractor yet, so they helped us prep our fields. It’s a nice community to be a part of.”
Despite the move from Heartbeet Farm’s previous location, Garvie says they’ve been able to retain their core CSA customer base, some of whom have been part of the CSA since it began in 2018. She hopes to continue growing the CSA and adding new customers each year.
“During COVID, there was that bump where people were concerned [about access to food]. But we still have the same concerns with climate change about food supply and we need to build our local food systems,” she says.
“It’s a positive choice that people can make by interacting with their local farmer – positive for them and us and the general community.”
A deep dive into how regenerative organic agricultural practices can benefit soil health with Brent Preston and Gillian Flies from The New Farm.
Soil quality is declining; according to Regeneration Canada, 33 per cent of soils worldwide are degraded, losing their ability to absorb water and grow plants, while also emitting their carbon content as CO2 into the atmosphere.
Gillian Flies and Brent Preston own and operate
The New Farm, providing high-quality organic produce to restaurants and specialty retail stores in the Toronto and Collingwood areas of Ontario. Cool-weather greens and root vegetables grow on the 20 farmed acres located in the Niagara Escarpment. Their approach to farming is “regenerative organic,” a relatively new sustainable ag method based on the Regenerative Organic Certificate developed by the Rodale Institute. While some consider regenerative and organic practices to be one and the same – as it was in the 1930s when “regenerative” was first coined by one of the founders of organic agriculture –the Canadian Organic Standards are not always prescriptive when it comes to practices that are gaining momentum among regenerative enthusiasts, such as conservation tillage and integrating animals. Nevertheless, both regenerative and organic principles are rooted in the same common practice: building soil health.
Soil is a living matter, hosting millions of organisms and sustaining wildlife while playing a crucial role in myriad processes in the global ecosystem, including nutrient cycling, climate regulation, water retention and food provision. Despite its importance, soil health is declining; according to Regeneration Canada, 33 per cent of soils worldwide are degraded, losing their ability to absorb water and grow plants, while also emitting their carbon content as CO2 into the atmosphere. Conventional farming practices can lead to significant reductions in soil quality from erosion, compaction and pollution. “When we were doing a lot of tillage for the first 10 years of our farm, we saw that our soil started breaking down in structure, and it would dry out really quickly when we had dry spells,” Preston says.
Soil quality decline has serious implications for human and environmental health. Fortunately, regenerative organic ag implements practices
The study took place between 2019 and 2021 at three AAFC sites: Agassiz, B.C.; Harrow, Ont.; and St. Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que., although each year the trials took place on different fields within each location.
In each location, a local standard rye variety was compared to Elbon, a southern U.S.-developed winter cereal rye, at three seeding rates: 150, 300, and 600 seeds per square metre (seeds/m2). There were also weedy and weed-free norye control plots.
Brackenridge also opted to compare treatments with and without postemergent herbicide applications.
Rye cover crops were terminated via roller crimping when plants reached a stage between 50 per cent anthesis and early milk stage. Brackenridge opted to use three-metre-wide rear tractormounted roller crimpers filled with water. Six days following termination, corn was planted with no-till planters directly into the crimped rye.
Brackenridge says seeding rates between 300 and 600 seeds/m2 seemed to be most effective in terms of weed control.
“The increase in weed control by mid and high seeding rates may be attributed to their higher biomass and ground coverage compared to the low seeding rate,” she writes in her thesis. “Increased cover crop biomass has been shown to increase ground coverage, which improves weed control.”
Interestingly, weed control improved with seeding rates between 300 and 600 seeds/m2, Brackenridge notes, but there was no statistical difference between the mid and high rate. In other words, producers can assume that 300 seeds/m2 is adequate.
Sweet corn in roller crimped cereal rye (cultivar Hazlet) sown at 600 seeds m2, four weeks after planting.
“Three hundred [seeds per square metre] is based on the typical rate that people would sow rye as a cover crop,” she says. “[It was] good to see that result, that [the highest rate is] not necessarily required, because that will save producers a lot of money.”
Although there was a positive correlation between mid and high seeding rates and weed control, neither rate – 300 or 600 –provided enough weed control to prevent yield loss in sweet corn.
Even so, Brackenridge says there are still appreciable benefits to the system.
“Future research should test the feasibility of applying post-emergent herbicides to control weeds after roller crimping,” Brackenridge concludes her thesis. “Combining roller-crimped rye with post-emergent herbicide could create
an effective integrated weed management program that reduces chemical inputs and builds soil health and stability.”
One experiment, where roller-crimped rye was combined with a post-emergent herbicide, performed really well, she says.
This means producers could potentially eliminate use of a preemergent herbicide and start to reduce reliance on chemical inputs.
“It doesn’t produce completely clean, high yields on its own, but having a combination is beneficial,” says Brackenridge. “It reiterates the value of integrated pest management – you can’t rely on one system exclusively. It’s combining multiple systems that will give us the best results.”
In terms of varietal differences, Brackenridge notes use of the earliermaturing variety Elbon offered no benefit to weed control or yield, partly because local standard varieties provided higher biomass.
