A Legacy of care starts with our community

Those touched by the care provided to them, or a loved one, are often inspired to give. Their hope is that their gift will show their gratitude and help ensure that this care will continue for their family, friends, and communitynow and in the future. Many of these donors want to say ‘thank you’ and wish they could do more.

Some do not realize that there are different ways to give and that there is a way to complete their vision of giving. A gift in a person’s Will or through their estate – often referred to as a legacy gift - is a way to accomplish that goal. Legacy giving can include a gift in your Will or listing the WDMH Foundation as a beneficiary to your RRSP, RRIF, TFSA, or Life Insurance Policy. After loved ones are cared for, this is a wonderful way to support excellent health care in your community and leave a lasting impact. Along with feeling fulfilled and knowing the special legacy you are leaving, legacy giving has incredible tax benefits – meaning your loved ones could receive more.

Many people believe that the size of the gift they could make would not be significant enough. All gifts, no matter the size, are important and leave an impact for our community.

No matter the reason for giving, whether it be for personal fulfillment, a way to say ‘thank you’, or for the charitable tax benefits, a legacy gift will help to ensure our community has excellent care available for everyone close to home.

To learn more about legacy giving to support Winchester District Memorial Hospital and/or Dundas Manor Long-Term Care Home, please contact fellow legacy donor, Erin Kapcala – Manager of Major and Planned Giving for the

WDMH Foundation at 613292-7468 or ekapcala@ wdmh.on.ca a.m. Dundas County 4-H Beef Achievement Day

Community. Care. Close to Home.

The information and opinions are obtained from various sources believed to be reliable, but their accuracy cannot be guaranteed.

The WDMH Foundation and its employees and agents assume no responsibility for errors or omissions or for damages arising from the use of the published information and opinions. Readers are cautioned to consult their own professional advisors to determine the applicability of information and opinions in any particular circumstances.

12:00 p.m. Meet the Keepers Rescue Animal Stage Presentation (Children’s Entertainment Tent)

12:00 p.m. – 6:00 p.m. Beer Garden Open (Entertainment Tent)

12:30 p.m. Dino Walk-about

12:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Rodeo Bar Open

1:00 p.m. Simmental and Angus Beef Cattle Show

1:00 p.m. – 2:00 p.m. Hillbilly Highway (Entertainment Tent) (All Ages Welcome)

1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Black Creek Rodeo presents the Kubota South Mountain Rodeo (Western Horse Ring)

2:00 p.m. Meet the Keepers Rescue Animal Stage Presentation (Children’s Entertainment Tent)

2:30 p.m. Dino Walk-about

2:30 p.m. – 3:30 p.m. Gail Gavan (Entertainment Tent) (All Ages Welcome)

3:30 p.m. Grand Prize Draw (Entertainment Tent)

4:00 p.m. – 5:30 p.m. George Canyon (Entertainment Tent) (All Ages Welcome)

6:00 p.m. Fair Closes

Fertilizer - Seed - Crop Protection

are possible.

careers.

Super corn borer resistant to Bt corn could infect Eastern Ontario first

by Peggy Brekveld, President, OFA

Canada’s federal, provincial and territorial ministers of agriculture get together once a year to discuss issues that are important to our sector across the country. Their most recent meeting just took place in New Brunswick, immediately following the summer Board meeting of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA), which brought together farm leaders from across Canada, including the Ontario Federation of Agriculture (OFA).

This was also an opportunity for the CFA to host its annual federal-provincialterritorial agriculture ministers’ roundtable to provide ministers with farmer perspectives on issues like the proposed national Sustainable Agriculture Strategy, the financial health of farm businesses and the industryled Grocery Sector Code of Conduct.

As farmers, we know that one of the key pieces of any sustainability strategy for agriculture means making sure that we’re talking about more than just the environment. The economic and social pillars of sustainability are just as important – critical, in fact, to making sure that the investments needed for environmental sustainability

Economically, we need business risk management programs to provide the support we need to address the risks that naturally come with farming, and a regulatory environment that is responsive, representative of the modern needs of our sector and doesn’t place our farmers at a competitive disadvantage compared to their international counterparts.

We also want to see that markets are fair, whether through our international trade agreements or in our domestic markets through the new Grocery Sector Code of Conduct that is currently in development and slated for implementation by the end of the year.

Socially, we need our rural communities to be healthy. Farmer mental wellness matters as that’s the key to our sector’s future – simply put, we can’t farm without farmers. Social sustainability also means protecting and strengthening our food security to ensure that Canadians continue to have access to affordable, high-quality food and that we protect our ability to grow, raise and produce as many different farm products as possible right here at home.

Equally, our environment needs to continue to be healthy. More than most people, farmers depend on the weather and on healthy soils and clean water for their livelihoods. We’ve long been committed to reducing our environmental footprint and working to leave our farms to the next generation of farmers in better condition than when we took them over at the start of our farming

There are, of course, many more ways that agriculture can continue to make its environmental footprint even better, from precision farming technologies that reduce our fertilizer use, and plant breeding that produces more disease resistant and drought tolerant crops to smart irrigation systems and automated tools and equipment that can help reduce the labour shortage on our farms.

Governments of all levels can support the environmental, economic and social sustainability of the farming sector by helping to fund initiatives and programs of all kinds that are broader and more costly than individual farmers can afford to pay for on their own.

Some of these are already being addressed through the newest federal-provincial agricultural policy framework, the Sustainable Canadian Agricultural Partnership. In Ontario, for example, the federal and provincial governments just recently announced funding for three programs under the Ontario Agricultural Sustainability Initiative that will help farm businesses be more productive and resilient.

Here in Ontario and nationally, there will also continue to be conversations around other important issues like animal health and biosecurity, international trade and emissions reductions and it’s important for farmers to continue to be included in those discussions so that new strategies, policies and legislation will work for all involved and help ensure a sustainable future for the sector.

by Nelson Zandbergen courtesy of Farmers Forum

European corn borer is becoming resistant to the Bt corn varieties that have effectively repelled the pest for 25 years, and Eastern Ontario producers are likely to see it munching on their crop first before it attacks anywhere else in the Province, attendees were told at the 2023 Eastern Ontario Crop Diagnostic Day at OMAFRA’s Winchester research station.

While the corn borer larvae and moth was first discovered in Canada about 100 years ago, the Bt corn resistant borer, which first turned up in a Nova Scotia cornfield in 2018, has since been found in New Brunswick and in the Montreal area, according to presenters Tracey Baute, an OMAFRA entomologist, and Jocelyn Smith, entomology research scientist at the University of Guelph. It’s the corn borer larvae that bore into the corn stalk and cause rotting.

“Here in this region in particular, we’re extra concerned,” Baute said, noting that wind events can carry the European corn borer moth beyond its regular 40km range after it pupates and emerges from corn stubble. “You guys are just close to any wind events carrying things in. If it’s going to happen in Ontario, it’ll be in this region first.”

A GMO success story, Bt corn handed producers revolutionary protection when it arrived in the marketplace 25 years ago. “If we lose Bt corn, it’ll be back to some old-school thinking or more expensive options,” Baute warned. “The reason why everyone moved to Bt is because spraying an insecticide is really difficult to do effectively and get the timing right to get those larvae when they hatch.”

Producers need to go back to scouting for corn borer, she said, an uncommon practice for decades. The small, cream coloured egg masses are laid on the underside corn leaves. The larvae get into the stalk and eat the plant from within, leaving holes.

Bt corn has done such a good job through the years that researchers, until recently, have had a tough time collecting corn borer specimens in the field. This year, however, an unprecedented number of egg masses turned up in a corn plot at the Winchester Research station. That doesn’t indicate Bt resistance, just that the species appears to be more prevalent in the environment this season.

“I’ve found more corn borer egg masses in this plot right here than I’ve ever seen in my life,” Smith said.

Veteran agronomist Gilles Quesnel similarly observed that it was his first time ever seeing corn borer egg masses.

The most advanced Bt corn contains four proteins that are toxic to the corn borer, and the latest tests on resistant corn borer at a site in Truro, Nova Scotia, showed that those larvae survived exposure to three of those proteins. Smith said that a new protein aimed at corn borer needs to be incorporated into Bt corn, but she estimated that this will take another eight years.

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