Yes indeed, summer did finally arrive on the west coast although up here on Vancouver Island it is about 3 weeks late.
Of course the first real sign of that is when the strawberry season begins and after last weekend we are in full swing. Having been a horticultural extension agent all my life it seems many of my friends are in the local farming business and know that I am around and… if they are short staffed, well you know how that goes.
So this weekend there I was grading strawberries, making cartons, unloading trucks and then on Sunday – in charge of the U-pick field which is what led me to write this down.
It was not an overly busy day, thanks to it being Fathers’ Day and a bike race down the road the farm is located on that ran from 8am until after lunch. Customers avoided the road like the plague until late morning. It never ceases to amaze me that these races have to be the first week or so of strawberry season – but I digress as that is a different story.
I was set up with a tent, table, cash box just in front of a row of trees behind which was about an acre of 2nd year Rainier strawberries. I barely had time to get the tally sheets out and in came my first customer who, it turned out had also picked the day before and wanted to get, as he bluntly told me, the last few berries as the field was poor. Hmm, I thought that was not what I had been told but I had not seen the field in a month, so not seeing anyone else around I trotted past the trees to check out this “poor field.”
Actually as I rounded the trees I saw red, even in the first two rows which were weak and obviously over picked. As I walked across the center of the field I saw the best U-pick field I have seen in a few years and began to wonder what on earth this fellow had been talking about. I looked around for him and there he was in the first two rows of the field. I know what you are thinking, but yes I did walk over and tell him if he moved another 10 rows in his containers would be full in 5 minutes but he said he was fine where he was.
Slowly the morning picked up and the cars started coming in. Since I knew I would have some spare time I began multitasking – no, this generation did not invent the term. Farmers have always multitasked – we just had different words for it. Seems to me I can remember being told to quit standing around and make myself useful while I was waiting for something else to happen on a farm chore – that was the invention of multitasking!
In this mode I had a small generator cover that I was going to paint a beautiful Navaho red with oil based paint – very carefully as I did not want to be covered from head to toe as I waited for customers to drive in. On that note it would have been much easier if I could have found a brush that did not look like a toilet boil cleaner – oh well that’s farming.
Over the next hour or so I did manage to do a reasonable job on the paint and had just pushed it behind the table when in came a couple with 2 young children of walking age – 2 and 3, I am guessing. They were a bubbly family and all piled out in search of that special summer treat – fresh strawberries. As mom and I chatted, oblivious to the whereabouts of the children we suddenly summoned by a plaintive “mommy”. As we both turned to look, there was little missy, both hands palms toward us – perfectly painted in Navaho Red!
"Crap", was all I could think – this is not going to be good. But to my surprise mom broke out in laughter and said, “Oh my god, I hope my daughter did not ruin your painting!” She then proceeded to apologize as we frantically tried to get oil based paint off tiny little soft hands with wet tissue. Of course it was also all over her clothes but mom was perfectly happy in that these clothes were for gardening and picking berries and it did not matter. I could have kissed that woman, but then that would also be a different story. All in all by the time they did emerge from the field – mom was correct. It was hard to see the paint amongst the strawberry stains from ear to ear and on most of her little daughter’s sun dress. You know there are customers that renew your faith in the human race!
And then there are the others. Picture a dark BMW SUV, all tinted windows, driving way to fast down the farm dirt road towards me and I just know this one is likely not to be as much fun. There are about 10 cars in a nice row parked down from the table and I wave the SUV towards them but no – the driver wants the space between the table and the first car and proceeds to shoe horn himself into a space meant for a Smart car or skateboard. He then slides out of the car wearing the fancy sunglasses and without apparently really looking at me (hard to tell with the shades) he asks, “Where is the farm?”
Well may be you might have been able to play that one straight but I could not. I replied, “You are standing on it”. The back door then crept open and squinting into the sun emerged a Goth styled and pierced teenager who said his dad wanted to pick some strawberries for Fathers’ Day. And pick they did – 3 lbs and left in another dust cloud.
The small children are really the reason I enjoy the interactions so much and there must have been 20 or so young kids that day and they were all so excited and I had tons of fun with all of them. The parents would bring their containers to be pre-weighed and in some cases they were not significant enough to even record but I would always ask the youngsters if they could get on my little scale.
They would than get very concerned looking and of course the parents would be smiling in the background and I would tell the children I had to weigh them to be certain they did not eat more than 10 lbs of berries. If they did I warned them I would have to either keep them on the farm or make them pay. Of course then I told them I was joking but one little guy actually wanted me to keep him – as long as he could drive the tractor I had parked there – he was about 3 years old.
And finally – it is a small world.
I was just about closing at 2 pm and an older couple walked up (yes, older than me!) and asked if they could pick and also asked if the cedar trees behind me were a maze. Indeed they are I replied and they told me they were related to farmers in Ontario that had quite a few mazes on their farm.I asked if that was Saunders Farm and I could have pushed them both over with a feather at that point. They had no idea that I would know Mark & Angela Saunders and Mark’s parents, Bill & Ann and that I actually had them out in BC speaking to farmers about 15 years ago. So you see this NAFDMA world is indeed very connected.
This article was written by Brent Warner P.Ag., White Loaf Ridge Associate and previously published in the July 2010 NAFDMA Newsletter. For more information on NAFDMA visit www.nafdma.com.
