Wine-o Wednesday!

On Wednesday we had some great on farm tours that kept us engaged all day! We stared at Beatty Seeds, a family owned seed company that handles seed production and packaging of corn, soybeans, and wheat. They specialize in Identity Preserved soybeans that are traceable and guaranteed non GMO. The seed is often shipped out to Japan or China for soybean production that eventually is processed into soy milk or tofu. Also, they are a certified food grade facility and have strict standards to meet to handle food grade wheat. Ha that rhymes. 

Next was a tour of a family fruit and vegetable farm. They market all their product through their own farm side stand. They took us all over their farm and pointed out the different fruits and veggies. They do multiple plantings of each to keep fresh product at their stand from spring to fall. Some of their popular crops include potatoes, onions, tomatoes, sweet corn, raspberries, lettuce, squash, asparagus, and so much more. They employed family members and four Jamaican workers through their busy season. This was a one of a kind farm tour! Just wish we would have had time to do some shopping. 

We made a quick stop at the County Farm Center store that was sort of a combination Big R and Amish goods. They sold freezer beef, pork, and lamb (all local) as well as other repackaged frozen foods. Here's a price comparison between what we saw and what the Kilgus's (couple from our tour group) charge, all in US dollars and similar local farm to consumer model. 

$11.99 / lb Canadian beef

$15.99 / lb Kilgus Farms beef

The last stop of the day was at the Clossen Chase Winery. This has been the highlight of the trip and not just because we drank wine there. The farm manager really knew his stuff, was wildly passionate about the business, and did a great job explaining things from start to finish. He spoke the farmer language and he spoke it loudly! We tried a Pinot Noir and two Pinot Grigios from different years. Not the sweet wines we see around our home wineries but damn good wine that retails for $30-$50 a bottle. He basically talked me out of ever wanting to start a vineyard due to the complexity of the business. I think I'll just be happy buying and sipping wine! 

It rains and it pours and now we're all wet.

Our tour stops today included Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, the US Embassy to Canada, and a tour of the Canadian Parliament all in Canada's national capital of Ottawa. We spent about 6 total hours driving between our morning ride to Ottawa, Ontario from Montreal, Quebec and our evening trip from Ottawa, Ontario to Belleville, Ontario. We were all happy and relieved to be in an English speaking province! The long drives gave me plenty of time to take a nap, catch up on emails, and chat with new friends about agriculture and what we saw today. 

Some take always :

• Canada and America, more specifically Illinois, are huge agriculture trade partners, trading things like corn and soybeans as well as processed foods and baked goods totaling $3.1 billion in trade. 
• Canada is the #1 producer of canola which was created in Canada and literally means Canada Oil Seed. 
• The US exports more agriculture products to Canada than it does the Japan, China, and the United Kingdom combined.
• The NAFTA trade agreement is very important to Canadian Agriculture and their consumers
• NAFTA is a bit one sided currently benefiting Canadian agriculture more than American agriculture and needs to be renegotiated

Did I mention that it rained? It has rained every damn day of our trip! Just for a little while and then it's usually beautiful for the rest of the day. Most of the time I have been able to grab my rain coat and stay dry but not today! We were traveling light because of the high security in the embassy and at parliament so I left basically everything on the bus. While standing in line at parliament, it began to rain. We had no where to go to escape it so there we all were in our wet polos and wet khakis with wet hair and running mascara. Let me tell you, everybody was a trooper. Just one more great memory made on this super fun trip and we did eventually dried off... just had a bit flatter hair and half the makeup. 

At dinner I tried a local (brewed in the same county) hard apple cider. It was awesome. 

Canada Day One/Two

Hi, hello, me again, out and about in Canada this week! I'm traveling with the Illinois Farm Bureau Young Leaders on their annual agriculture industry tour. For six days we will be traveling between Montreal and Toronto tour farms, meeting with Canadian agriculture officials, and checking out some tourist spots. Stay tuned for all the fun. 

Travel Arrangements

Life is busy and I have the tendency to over schedule myself. Here's maybe my best example yet. My best friends Matt & Ashlen are getting married and that means one heck of a bachelorette party in the Ozarks. That party unfortunately overlapped with traveling to Canada. I had to be in Montreal by 2pm Sunday to meet up with the group so I picked up a rental car in St. Louis on our way down to the Ozarks Thursday evening. Then I had to leave the Ozarks at midnight on Saturday night to drive to St. Louis and catch my 6AM flight St Louis > Chicago > Montreal. Ouch. Needless to say I got less than 2 hours of sleep plus a couple cat naps on the plane and tour bus. Essentially I didn't sleep for a full 38 hours. That travel rivaled Japan > Denver > Panama. I ran into A bunch of other young leaders and was happy to be traveling in a group. I was pretty much a zombie. We had a couple hours to kill in Montreal before the tour bus arrived so we had lunch and a beer at the airport. While sitting there we made friends with a nice older Canadian man who was waiting to pick up his son. He offered us some hard candies, made by his family business. They were maple leaf shaped and in plain clear wrappers. I had enough sanity to ask if there were drugs in them but not quite enough sanity to not eat one. I literally took candy from a stranger. Sorry mom. In my defense, it was from a Canadian (aren't all Canadians super polite and honest and friendly?), and it was a maple syrup flavored, and I did live to tell the tale. It was delicious and I'm fairly certain it was drug-free. Be adventurous am I right? Haha

Dairy farms

The beginning of the trip started off with three dairy farms and GEA, a manufacturing plant that builds manure handling machinery like manure spreaders, pumps, and stall cleaners. Each of the dairies had a bit of a different flare. The first was super fancy, beautiful farm stead, well manicured and served us beer. This family farm had 2 robotic milkers and 100 cows. Everyone worked on the farm including two cute little girls in pink and purple overalls. They ran Case IH equipment. Each piece was licensed and had a state plate. Even their side by sides had license plates on them. Here we also learned about milk quotas in Canada. Quotas guarantee milk prices and are bought and sold by dairy farmers. The amount of quotas available (or production capacity) is set by the Canadian government. This basically guarantees income to their dairy farmers and based on this stop leads me to believe, it encourages dairy farmers to invest in efficiencies. Their farm was fully automated from how bedding is distributed (by rail in the ceiling) to how the bunks are cleaned, and how the milk is handled. Did I mention each of the robotic milkers cost $250,000? 

The second was huge, boasting 22 robotic milkers and 1100 cows. They farm 3,800 acres of corn for silage, corn for grain, wheat, and alfalfa. The farm is ran by about 18 employees. Half of their production is kosher milk, when they are milking the cows, three days a week, they have a Rabi on the farm. Apparently this makes the milk "kosher". This speciality gains them about 15-20% premium on milk sales. There really isn't a market for organic milk in Canada. Another checkmark in the Canada vs America column. 

The third dairy was more modest and traditional for Canada. They had 110 cows and 2 robotic milkers but they will expand to 3 robotic milkers yet this year. Their controlled flow barn sorts the cows based on their leg tag. Some go to be milked if it's time others just get moved to a feed area. This is different than the two earlier dairies that run on free flow. Their cows can go into the milking stall anytime but only get milked if its time. 

Did you know Quebec-ians speak mostly French? Yea. Language barrier. I must be a stupid America because I wasn't expecting that. Let's just say ordering dinner last night and breakfast this morning was interesting. Delicious but challenging. 

Jeep the Mac

Well guys and gals this lady farm is traveling... in April... during planting season. Call me crazy! We planned this last minute run up to northern Michigan for "Jeep the Mac". The farm is not being neglected, not to worry.  We've had a lot of rain in the last two weeks, no-till farming puts us a few days behind everyone else for fields to dry out, and all the spring spraying is complete. With cool temps in the forecast and possible rain showers we decided to just go do it!
Jeep the Mac is basically a huge gathering of Jeeps to do fun stuff together. In this case we are talking about over 600 Jeeps crossing the Mackinaw Bridge in a lovely parade, then off-roading more than 100 miles of trails on Drummond Island the next day. If you can't figure out why people think this is a super cool thing to do, don't worry, it's a Jeep thing, you wouldn't understand.
I'm a pretty savvy traveler, boasting my ability to pack for two weeks abroad, to two climates, in a carry on suitcase. I'm a packing badass, Okay? Well, not everyone is perfect. I failed today in a big way. I left home without my purse! No drivers license (nobody better rat me out to the popo), no credit cards, no cash! F*%#! I remembered to pack the blister block, the deck of cards, the wine bottle opener, and the the poo-pourri but not my damn purse?
All I can say is I'm thankful I didn't get pulled over on our 400+ mile trip and that I have awesome friends and family to cover me when I stumble in life. Not my finest moment. There. The honest truth.