Dwagenheim

I got up and joined Ryan, Lovena, Kai, and Tosh for breakfast. We headed over to the farm and Ryan showed me around. Blue Jay Lake Farm is an organic farm on 300 acres of land that was formerly a clear-cut site. It is owned by a couple named Henry and Margaret and they are registered WWOOF hosts. The WWOOF organization allows people to come work on an organic farm for room and board. The farm was great. There were raspberries, blueberries, strawberries, plums, pears, apples, corn, greens, herbs, flowers, cows, chickens and much more. Alex, a French-Canadian guy, had been staying here for a year already and Ryan and Lovena about the same time. Ryan and Lovena had about 4 years experience with this type of farming from an area on mainland B.C. near Whistler. So, we got to work and started harvesting pears. We were like monkeys climbing up in the pear tree, sampling the fruit as we worked, of course. It was quite a task to keep the nearby grazing cows from raiding our pear cache. They would practically stampede towards the base of the tree when a pear dropped to the ground. This made the ladder workers a bit nervous, as they could easily knock away a ladder. We finished off the workday picking basil and various greens for the produce boxes that are delivered throughout the community twice a week. I think it’s a great idea to offer such great organic fruits and veggies from the farm. It promotes healthier eating and more awareness about organic foods. Everyone from the farm gathered for dinner and we ate well and talked about various things. I’ve started to learn that farm work can be very rewarding, but also lots of hard work. You have to keep up on many things and certain routines are necessary, even vital to the function of the farm. Lovena showed me how to milk a cow before we headed back to the trailer. It was quite hard to get my big hands around the small teet but we managed to pump out a gallon pretty fast. From the cows milk, yogurt, yogurt cream cheese, and paneer (a kind of cheese) is made. We headed back to the trailer and Lovena put Tosh and Kai to bed and then we relaxed after a full day on the farm.

Peace

Dave

Pic: A big Douglas Fir on Blue Jay Lake Farm. This one is not exceptionally old, but it is a stand out in these times, when all the old trees have been cut down.