Growing Vegetables in a Changing Climate at Sundog Farm
by Mary Bailey
Kaelin Whittaker from the Ruby Apron and I spent a morning with Jenny and James Berkenbosch at their farm north of Edmonton. What we saw and heard was disheartening—a rude reminder that farming is always risky, this year more than ever.
James and Jenny are a decade into growing organic vegetables at Sundog Farm. James was a cabinet-maker and Jenny an art and English teacher when they decided that growing food was what they wanted to do as a family. James’ parents are Ruth and Dennis Vriend, who operated an organic farm south of the city and sold the vegetables at the Old Strathcona Farmers’ Market for decades. James and Jenny relied on their 30 years of experience and knowledge, especially in the beginning.
But nothing could have prepared them for this season. “This is top of the line soil, sandy loam,” says James. But even with that, the weather has spelled disaster.
“This is not a fun story,” says Jenny, as we start to walk around the fields. Today, everything looks different. Fields of carrots lie ruined by flooding. Water pooling where it has never pooled before. There are yellowing leaves in some fields, stunted plants in others and crops several weeks behind where they need to be. The corn has just started to tassel out.
Jenny and James planted onions and leeks, several varieties of carrots, potatoes and beans, corn, all the brassicas, radishes, spinaches, garlic, fennel, herbs, lettuces, beets, summer turnips, mustard, kohlrabi, rutabaga, parsnips, celery and celeriac, summer and winter squash, field cucumbers, kales, Swiss chard and other greens. The strawberries and rhubarb are perennial and the sunchokes come back every year. This is their 11th season growing vegetables and the ninth at this usually lovely farm on a dead-end road near the Sturgeon River.
“It’s like we had this continuous source of water.” says Jenny. “When it did heat up, the moisture would go into the clouds and come right back down again. We know hail, one year we had hail eight times. We have never seen this much rain; never experienced this sort of flooding. We weren’t able to plant successive crops this year as the fields were too wet to get into. We won’t have any more lettuces or baby greens,” she says.
“The brassicas are hit, the potatoes are doing ok,” says James. “The fall crop is an issue, if we don’t get the heat.”
Walking through the wet and flooded fields is sobering. It’s the side of farming nobody wants to see or talk about. We worry about extra weeds and having to mow the lawn more often. They worry about how to pay the bills. “All told, we’ll be down about 50 per cent this year,” says Jenny. “We were able to send one of our workers to an apiary, but the other we may have to send home.”
As we think about that, Jenny breaks down. All the bright and sunny feelings we associate with farming and farmers markets have been drowned.
Along with a lousy crop the markets are slow. “We took on the Old Strathcona Market this year,” says Jenny. “The plan was to take over Dan and Christine’s booth.” (The long stand on the east wall where two generations of Vriends have sold vegetables.) “But that didn’t happen. And downtown, we’re not sure if it’s because of the flip flop about the location or that there is fewer vendors there or because it’s too cold and rainy, but numbers are way way down.”
Jenny has been remarkably open about their situation, something they think many farmers are in, even they are not talking about it. They are not your stoic grandfather-type farmer. “I feel like we were one of the first to say, hey, we are taking a hit here.
“We have been transparent about it. And, we have had some support. People are saying, “Ok, today we’ll buy what you have,” says Jenny. “A friend said; ‘people get the opportunity to really know what supporting your local farmer means. To be connected to your source of food on every level.’”
“This is reality.” says Kaelin. “You buy what’s there. It’s not always going to be what you thought you came for.” Of course, this leads off into a conversation about how people don’t cook anymore.
“We’re wrestling with, do we keep going?” says Jenny. “Last year was not good, our product was fine, but people don’t show up in September due to the smoke and the snow. Do we limp out the season? Seems illogical to keep on going.”
There is still beauty in the desolation. Fields of leeks are a variation on a blue green theme. The buckwheat is blooming between the rows. Sunchoke blossoms, like tiny sunflowers, wink among the leaves. Jenny shows us the delicate flowers from purple carrots sown in that patch last year.
Jenny uses this inspiration in her other vocation. She is a painter and often works with agricultural ideas. Her studio is up a set of colourful stairs and looks out on the fields. We wander among a few paintings in different stages of completion.” I love it up here, gives me joy,” says Jenny.
I am writing this a few weeks after the visit, on a sunny breezy day in August, one of the few sunny days we’ve had this season. If we had had more of these this story would be vastly different. I check in with Jenny.
“We’ve made peace I think,” she says. “We mowed what looked really depressing. We lowered our expectations for the year. We’ll cut back on a few things. We’ll adjust and do what it takes.
“And we are feeling good about the support we’ve been shown.”