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Originally published:

January 2019
Vol. 105 Issue 1

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Stories In This Edition

Victoria tweaks ALR rules

Ranch must allow anglers

Grappling with challenges

Editorial: Learning from leopards

Back forty: Livestock protection is a grey matter

Viewpoint: One zone shows foresight as BC ag evolves

Popham pursues ambitious agenda as 2019 arrives

Milk stocks rebuild but skimmed milk an issue

Holstein spring show grows, moves to Chilliwack

Dairy producers withhold national levies

Wave of retirements sweeps through dairy associations

Fund aims to give BC fruit growers a competitive edge

Ag Brief: New chair for Farm Industry Review Board

Ag Brief: BC Tree Fruits shake-up

Ag Brief: Thompson retires from dairy centre

New trap set to reduce Okanagan starling flocks

Consumer prices could buoy farm cash receipts

BC potatoes yield increase in 2018

‘Green rush’ overwhelms OK planning staff

Show, gala showcases BC agriculture

Hort show covers buds to spuds

Sidebar: Budding interest

Spotlight on dairy, innovation

Popular dairy tour showcases diversity

Overseas markets demand top quality

Sidebar: Gerbrandt coordinates berry research

Local seed initiative shifts focus to economics

Big dreams for small pepper growers

Cattle feeders bullish on packing plant

Research: Increasing green fodder could decrease allergies

Beekeepers learn to defend against wildlife

Online platform connects producers, consumers

Public trust programming to expand in 2019

Farmers institutes meet to forge connections

The rock road of water buffalo in BC

Wannabe: Pulling together

Woodshed: Deborah finds it’s better to give than receive

Jude’s Kitchen: Start healthy

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7 days ago

Farmland Advantage is receiving a $445,000 grant from the federal government. The program, the “brainchild” of Invermere cattle rancher Dave Zehnder, provides compensation to farmers for their conservation efforts to protect BC’s grasslands, riparian areas and wildlife habitat. The funding from Environment and Climate Change Canada under the Species at Risk Partnerships on Agricultural Lands (SARPAL) and Priority Places programs, will be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. Rewarding farmers for enhancing riparian areas appeared in our March 2022 edition and you can view it at ... See MoreSee Less

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Rewarding farmers for enhancing riparian areas

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INVERMERE – Farmers and ranchers in the Columbia Valley will continue to see rewards for taking action to conserve and enhance important riparian areas on their farms. The Windermere District Farmer...
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2 weeks ago

A standing-room only crowd of more than 250 people attended a public hearing the Agricultural Land Commission hosted in Langley Monday night regarding a proposal to include 305 acres controlled by the federal government in the Agricultural Land Reserve. More than 76,000 people have signed an online petition asking municipal and provincial governments to protect the land from development, and for the federal government to grant a long-term lease to the Heppells. Read more in this morning's Farm News Update from Country Life in BC. conta.cc/3XYXw6k ... See MoreSee Less

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Your weekly farm news update

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The agricultural news source in British Columbia since 1915 January 25 2023 Surrey ALR inclusion cheered A standing-room only crowd of more than 250 people attended a public hearing the Agricultural L
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Mike Manion Pitt Meadows City Councillor

2 months ago

Christmas tree growers in BC are seeing strong demand this season and prices remain comparable to last year. But the number of tree farms has decreased dramatically over the past five years and the province will increasingly need to look elsewhere if it wants to meet local demand. More in this week's Farm News Update from Country Life in BC. ... See MoreSee Less

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Christmas trees in demand

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Christmas tree growers in BC are seeing strong demand, with high quality trees making it to market. “The market is good. We’ll probably outdo last year and last year was one of our best years…
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2 months ago

Another four poultry flocks in the Fraser Valley have tested positive for avian influenza over the weekend -- 15 in the last week alone. There are 60 farms currently under quarantine in BC, more than any other province in Canada and three times that of Alberta, which ranks second. Officials maintain the virus is being spread by dust and groundwater and not farm-to-farm transmission. No farms in the Interior have tested positive this fall. ... See MoreSee Less

Another four poultry flocks in the Fraser Valley have tested positive for avian influenza over the weekend -- 15 in the last week alone. There are 60 farms currently under quarantine in BC, more than any other province in Canada and three times that of Alberta, which ranks second. Officials maintain the virus is being spread by dust and groundwater and not farm-to-farm transmission. No farms in the Interior have tested positive this fall.
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Avian influenza virus can be killed by chlorine at no higher a concentration than is present in drinking water, so unless farms are using untreated groundwater in their barns I don't see how it could be a source of transmission. www.researchgate.net/publication/5594208_Chlorine_Inactivation_of_Highly_Pathogenic_Avian_Influen...

2 months ago

In a surprise move, Lana Popham -- hailed at the recent BC Dairy Industry Conference as a key ally of the agriculture sector -- has been replaced by Abbotsford-Mission MLA Pam Alexis as part of a cabinet overhaul today by new BC premier David Eby. Popham will now oversee Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport. The two ministers worked closely together following the atmospheric river events last fall. ... See MoreSee Less

In a surprise move, Lana Popham -- hailed at the recent BC Dairy Industry Conference as a key ally of the agriculture sector -- has been replaced by Abbotsford-Mission MLA Pam Alexis as part of a cabinet overhaul today by new BC premier David Eby. Popham will now oversee Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport. The two ministers worked closely together following the atmospheric river events last fall.Image attachment
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Goes to show how far-removed our current government is from the agricultural sector. To put someone in this position who has no farming background is a slap in the face to all of our hard-working producers.

Going to be a heck of a learning curve. Helping the agricultural community recover from the biggest natural disasters in history, handling the avian influenza outbreak that is threatening our poultry industry, dealing with a crisis in meat processing, managing ongoing threats from climate change, supporting producers who are facing unprecedented inflation in an industry with very slim margins to begin with..... to name a few of the challenges our new Minister will have to face all with one of the lowest budgets of any ministry. I wish her the best of luck but I hope she's got a lot of support around her.

Best of wishes in your new position

Congrats to Pam, cool to see a Fraser Valley based ag minister but also so sad to see Lana reassigned . I have no doubt she will do an amazing job in her new role.

Will be missed by #meiernation

Bryce Rashleigh

Nooooooo!

Lana did a shit job and now we have a minister with no farming background at all. Aren’t we lucky..

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Cattle feeders bullish on packing plant

Proposal to grow the local industry will keep cash in BC

December 31, 2018 byTom Walker

WESTWOLD – Townhall meetings as the new year gets underway will determine whether or not a beef packing plant proposed for Prince George will go ahead. If it does, it will mean changes in how the BC industry finishes cattle.

Someone intimately familiar with what that could mean is BC Association of Cattle Feeders executive director Andrea van Iterson, whose family has run Westwold View Farms near Kamloops since relocating  from Kelowna in 1993.

“I have this deep love for the place and the cattle industry,” she says. “I worked off farm for about eight years, but I’ve been back full-time for four years now.”

The farm includes a dairy as well as a backgrounding operation that feeds 2,500 animals each winter.

“We purchase calves in the fall, mostly through the BC Livestock Producers Co-op auctions in Kamloops, though we do get some from Alberta and some direct from ranchers here in BC,” she says.

They look for smaller calves between 350 and 500 pounds, both steers and heifers, and aim to double their weight. The steers are typically 875 to 900 pounds when they leave, while the heifers reach around 850.

The largest ones will begin to leave as soon as February and the last ones are out the door by May.

“Typically, our animals are under contract and go south to a finishing feedlot in the US,” she says. “But that depends on our cow plan each fall.”

The finishing feedlot doubles their weight again over the next six months, up to a slaughter size of 1,500 to 1,600 pounds.

While the pens will be empty by spring, the work doesn’t stop. Some grass-fed cattle spend the summer, but the operation hinges on growing its own forage.

Year-round work

“We bale alfalfa and we grow corn that we put up for silage and have some extra dairy hay that we are able to sell,” says van Iterson.

Cow manure and composted chicken manure nourishes the forage crops and is their only source of fertilizer. All the feedlot waste (sawdust and manure) is carefully composted and sold to commercial clients including landscapers, school districts and the city of Kamloops.

Costs are managed with the same eye to efficiency.

“There is no ‘let’s guess this,’” says van Iterson. “We try to buy our extra inputs like barley in the summer months when it’s a little bit cheaper and we will try to contract some so we have a pretty good idea going into the fall what our costs will be through the winter.”

Three unknowns are exchange rate fluctuations, how weather will affect the crops and price of extra feed ingredients, and, of course, calf prices.

“Some years, the calf prices are high and the cow-calf guy has a wonderful year and we are paying more for their calf,” says van Iterson. “And maybe the calf isn’t worth more out the other end, or maybe it is worth more, but we don’t take the opportunity when we should and prices drop through the winter.”

She says contracting is a way to hedge against price swings.

“We contract most of what we do, so that is our way of managing the risk,” she explains. “There is Western Livestock Price Insurance we can buy. It’s a government-run program, kind of like the crop insurance program but different.”

With respect to the proposed packing plant, she doesn’t think cattle feeders need convincing.

Excitement

“There is excitement in the feeding industry around the proposed BC packing plant,” she says. “If there is somewhere to kill cattle, we can get a supply of them.”

Westwold View has looked into feeding year-round but hasn’t done it, even though it could make economic sense.

“Any pounds that we put on the cattle we are getting paid for, so the longer we retain them that, is going to benefit us,” she says. “If we had a market in BC, we would never turn that away.”

A local packing plant would also remove middlemen from the market.

Right now, there’s a broker for every transaction. A producer sells calves at the auction mart, which takes a commission. Backgrounders feed them and when the animals go for finishing, they are going to go through a broker again as another trade occurs.

“There wouldn’t be the in-between backgrounder like us if there wasn’t money in it,” says van Iterson.

The new plant could create finishing opportunities in BC, helping keep more money at home. But producers need to see a clear benefit versus selling at auction.

“There is likely going to need to be some retained ownership through the feeding process so that they get their premium when the animal goes into the BC plant,”  says van Iterson.

On the whole, however, she thinks change will come.

“It is very welcome to the feeding industry,” she says. “Build it and they will come.”

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