5 minute read
Beauty. Joy. Abundance.
Local Farmers
BY KATE GIRARD
What word do you use to describe work that is 24/7, 365 days a year, requires you to be outside in all kinds of weather and — the kicker — often generates so little income, you have to take on another job and/or borrow large sums of money?
Believe it or not, the word for two local farmers is “joy.”
Erica DeFrane and Marlene Lewis may have vastly different backgrounds, but both are committed to farming as a way of life.
DeFrane says Steld Farm is “my happy place.” She describes her excitement in spring when she notices the first sprouts of grass, pulls her first calf or sees a hen who has been hiding suddenly reappear with baby chicks. “I wouldn’t trade it for anything,” she says.
Lewis, who farms Empress Acres with her husband, Peter, and the help of others, shares that clarity. The first line on the farm’s website declares their vision: “69 acres of beauty, joy and abundance.”
DeFrane comes from a long line of farmers in Cedar. “My kids are fourth generation 4-H,” she says proudly. In fact, her parents, Greig and Joanne McLeod, met in 4-H and went on to have a dairy farm near Quennell Lake.
DeFrane jokes, “I was not quite born in a barn, but I was raised in one.” In 2007, she bought a 53-acre blueberry farm on Michael Lake from Irene Trudell, and she continues the U-pick operation the Trudells began in 1973. Altogether, DeFrane farms 120 acres, including land leased for pasture and hay.
Lewis, on the other hand, did not come to farming intentionally. She still works in her profession as a speech-language pathologist, and her husband, Peter, though retired, uses his skills as a former professional photographer on the farm’s website.
In 2017, they teamed up with two partners and bought a farm from Cliff and Suzanne Haslam on the corner of Adshead and Haslam Roads. Their dream was to raise empress trees, one of the fastest-growing trees in the world, but they soon realized the trees didn’t grow well in this location.
The partners pulled out, and the Lewises were left with the farm. What to do? They decided not to sell. Instead, they committed to transforming the property into a viable business, producing healthy, organic food for the community.
However, growing food for a living is a daunting task. For most farmers, it’s essential to diversify.
Consider all the different work done by Erica DeFrane in a year. As soon as Christmas is over, she’s out pruning blueberry bushes, a task that continues for four or five months.
Once the plants flower in early May, she turns to mowing the grass between rows and to irrigating. Haying also happens in those months. In July and August, the U-pick sales begin.
Somehow, DeFrane also raises pigs and thirty or so cows, selling sides of beef to customers as well as young stock to other farms. Recently, she started a bit of relief milking for a younger dairy farmer.
AND she has started a new project that will be revealed in 2024. Her face lights up when she talks about it. “Stay tuned,” she says, with an impish grin.
At Empress Acres, Peter and Marlene Lewis are busy too, looking after the viable empress trees while exploring ways to expand food production.
The Lewises are a generation older than DeFrane, and Peter had a stroke five years ago, so they farm with the help of others.
Finding the right partners is not always easy, but nurturing the young employees is clearly a joy for them.
Currently, the farm produces vegetables and flowers as well as eggs, pork, and turkeys. Empress Acres is also a popular spot for weddings.
Lewis is determined to fi nd a way to maximize food production and make the farm self-sustaining. “You have to be able to do things beyond agriculture,” Marlene says, though she adds that sometimes insurance requirements and government regulations make that difficult.
Both women value the connections between their work and the larger community. For one thing, farmers themselves have their own community — a tight-knit group that offers support when needed.
DeFrane and Lewis also get a lot of satisfaction when customers tell them how much they’ve enjoyed the food produced on their farms.
“People don’t realize how important farming is,” says DeFrane. With the rising price of farmland and the cost of doing business, farms can only survive with our support. “We have to help each other,” she says.
“Buy local. Go to U-picks, farm stands, and farmers’ markets. In the grocery store, choose BC or Canadian products,” she enthuses. “Grow a garden. Remember where your food comes from.”
Here in Cedar and area, we are so fortunate. The beauty, joy and abundance of farming are there for all of us to share.
