• Menu
  • Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

Country Life In BC Logo

The agricultural news source in British Columbia since 1915

  • Headlines
  • Calendar
  • Subscribe
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Archives
  • Contact
  • Search
  • Headlines
  • Calendar
  • Subscribe
  • Advertise
  • About
  • Archives
  • Contact
  • Search

Primary Sidebar

Originally published:

OCTOBER 2022
Vol. 108 Issue 10

Subscribe Now!

Sign up for free weekly FARM NEWS UPDATES

Select list(s) to subscribe to


By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: Country Life in BC, 36 Dale Road, Enderby, BC, V0E1V4. You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact
Your information will not be
shared or sold ever

Stories In This Edition

Greenhouse effect

Animal welfare under review

Avian influenza returns

BC Tree Fruit consolidation triggers revolt

Editorial: Sovereign realities

Back 40: Water remains a battleground in the US, BC

Viewpoint: Is agritech the tail wagging the dog?

Abattoir closure leaves producers scrambling

Canada comes up short on farm risk management

The show must go on

Ag Briefs: 4-H projects sell well at PNE

Ag Briefs: Strong growth for organics

Ag Briefs: Rate hike demands planning

Ranch suffers third natural disaster in a year

New abattoir opens in Pitt Meadows

Milk producers keeping an eye on free fatty acids

Cool season puts corn varieties to the test

BC members added to national youth council

Peace producers engage in on-farm research

Growth implants deliver big returns

Katz a keeper

Cannabis creates jobs for lean ranch operation

Post-harvest soil sampling yields input insights

Cranberry field day showcases Vasanna variety

Chilliwack tour showcases farm automation

Chilliwack blooms as Canada’s chrysanthemum capital

Grape grower has a passion for perfection

Plethora of pumpkins

Rural communities see surge in farmland sales

Farm Story: Crops prevail in spite of challenges

Woodshed: Kenneth seeks some advice on real estate

Day at the Farm delights visitors from the city

Jude’s Kitchen: Have a squish squash, very berry Thanksgiving

More Headlines

Follow us on Facebook

Comments Box SVG iconsUsed for the like, share, comment, and reaction icons

4 weeks ago

It’s been four years since the last tulip festival was held in Abbotsford, but this year’s event promises to be an even bigger spectacle than ever. Spanning 27 acres along Marion Road, Lakeland Flowers will display more than 70 varieties of the spring blossom, including fringe tulips and double tulips, the first of six months of flower festivals hosted by the farm. Writer Sandra Tretick spoke with Lakeland Flowers owner Nick Warmerdam this spring to find out how the floods on Sumas Prairie in 2021 have had an impact on his business plan as he transitions from wholesale cut flower grower to agri-tourism. We've posted the story to our website this month. It's a good read.

#CLBC #countrylifeinbc #tulipfestival
... See MoreSee Less

Link thumbnail

Tulip grower makes the shift to agritourism

www.countrylifeinbc.com

ABBOTSFORD – On a bright sunny day in early April, Nick Warmerdam points out his office window at No. 4 and Marion roads to a spot about half a kilometre away across the Trans-Canada Highway.
View Comments
  • Likes: 6
  • Shares: 2
  • Comments: 1

Comment on Facebook

Omg 🥹 Jared Huston let’s go pls

1 month ago

Farming, like any other job.. only you punch in at age 5 and never punch out 🚜 ... See MoreSee Less

View Comments
  • Likes: 18
  • Shares: 1
  • Comments: 1

Comment on Facebook

Easton Roseboom Levi Roseboom🚜

1 month ago

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is allocating $15 million to be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. for a perennial crop replant program benefitting tree fruit, hazelnut, berry and grape growers. The program aims to cover 100% of plant removal costs and 75% of replanting costs. Funds are also available for sector development. The new program replaces a suite of sector-specific replant programs and recognizes the importance of sector adaptation in the face of market, disease and weather challenges.
View Comments
  • Likes: 2
  • Shares: 1
  • Comments: 0

Comment on Facebook

1 month ago

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year. ... See MoreSee Less

Just a week after the Canadian Food Inspection Agency officials revoked the last primary control zones established in the Fraser Valley to control last fall’s outbreak of highly pathogenic avian influenza, a new detection on April 29 at a commercial premises in Chilliwack underscored the risk of a spring wave. This is the first new detection since January 22, also in Chilliwack, and brings to 104 the number of premises affected since the current outbreak began April 13, 2022. The disease has impacted 3.7 million birds in BC over the past year.
View Comments
  • Likes: 0
  • Shares: 2
  • Comments: 1

Comment on Facebook

Any other details for FVN and chillTV please? radiodon11@gmail.com

1 month ago

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agriculture's interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry. ... See MoreSee Less

The province is contributing $3.2 million for upgrades to the Barrowtown pump station in Abbotsford that was overwhelmed during the November 2021 flooding on Sumas Prairie, part of a collaborative approach to flood mitigation in the region. During a press conference at the BC Ministry of Agriculture and Food offices in Abbotsford today, the province said a collaborative approach that includes First Nations is needed as Abbotsford pursues a comprehensive flood mitigation strategy due to the potential impacts on Indigenous lands. Agricultures interests will be represented by technical teams within the agriculture ministry.
View Comments
  • Likes: 3
  • Shares: 1
  • Comments: 1

Comment on Facebook

I sure hope part of that money is to educate the people in charge of the pumps and drainage system! They just relayed on computers and weren’t even physically monitoring the water levels. I’ve lived in the Fraser Valley my whole life and the old guys managing that system know how to do it. The new generation just sit behind computer screens and don’t physically watch the water levels. That system works very well when you do it right. The Fraser river levels are very important. The system is designed to drain the Sumas Canal (the part that runs thru the valley) into the Fraser. When they let it get backed up it put pressure on the dyke and the weak part burst. Simple science. And yes, the dykes need to be worked on too. Abbotsford has not been maintaining properly for years.

Subscribe | Advertise

Chilliwack tour showcases farm automation

Better quality, better efficiency drive tech adoption

September 28, 2022 byPeter Mitham

CHILLIWACK – A better quality product with fewer workers was the common rationale for the adoption of technology at four agri-food businesses showcased during a recent tour Chilliwack Economic Partners Corp. hosted.

The day-long event September 9 treated more than 50 representatives of government, business and the media to tours of Dutch Heritage Greenhouse, which specializes in cut chrysanthemums; Brooknook Farms, a robotic dairy operation; MolsonCoors, whose Chilliwack brewery uses local water and hops; and Canadian Organic Feeds.

The businesses had made significant investments in their operations over the past three years, and the tour was a chance to show off the latest technology and other innovations.

MolsonCoors, which relocated its brewery to Chilliwack in 2019 from Vancouver, offered the best example of how technology is helping it do more with fewer people.

Just six of the brewery’s 100 workers brew the plant’s annual production of 100 million litres of beer. Based in a control room off the main production floor, the workers monitor signals coming from the stainless steel vats where the malt is soaked, fermented and ultimately pumped into a high-tech “flavour kitchen” for final adjustment before canning.

The majority of workers are employed in the packaging and distribution operations, themselves highly automated production lines that can fill 1,200 cases a minute.

“Everything’s automation in this brewery,” said Wenji Liu, brewery team lead.

Samples undergo regular analysis, verifying that brewing systems are delivering a consistent product. Samples are sent monthly to MolsonCoors’ corporate lab for further testing.

The brewery is situated on land excluded from the Agricultural Land Reserve to accommodate uses related to agriculture and food processing.

However, MolsonCoors also chose the site because of access to clean water and local hops. With the revival of the local hop industry in the mid-2000s, Molson began sourcing hops from the Sartori property in Lindell Beach. Now, it uses hops from several properties in beers distributed coast to coast.

Water, meanwhile, is managed like a precious resource. The brewery has invested $2 million in landscaping that requires minimal water use, among other conservation measures.

“I like to use water for beer, and that’s it,” quipped brewery general manager David Hamel.

High efficiency

Water is also tightly managed at Dutch Heritage Greenhouse, which collects rainwater for use in its state-of-the-art greenhouse completed in 2019. Twice the size of its previous facility, it was built with automation and efficiency in mind. This extends to water use.

“We have a silo that collects rainwater, and also an irrigation ditch outside that collects rainwater. So in this greenhouse, even though we’re constantly irrigating, we actually use less than the annual rainfall,” co-owner Lukas Breugem told the tour.

Water and resource conservation is also in play at Brooknook Farms, where Mark Ricka showcased an expansion completed last year. Purchased in 2015 with a view to making the leap to robotic milking, the dairy keeps close tabs on milk quality. While the DeLaval robots gather information on individual cattle and send alerts to Ricka, the dairy also employs simple strategies such as pre-cooling milk to ensure freshness and save energy in the bulk tank.

During the precooling process, heat transfers from milk to water destined for the hot water boiler, reducing the energy requirement there, too.

The final stop on the tour, Canadian Organic Feeds, showed off its new feed mill built in the former Agropur plant on Yale Road. Purchased in 2017, the former butter and ice cream plant was converted and three-ton silos handling seven feed ingredients were erected.

Overseen by owners Darren and Jen Jansen and three workers, the roller mill can be programmed for a specific grind at a set time. Grains can be milled overnight, for example, so workers can prepare mixes the next morning.

This has made for an efficient operation that distributed to farms as far east as the Kootenays as well as through local businesses including Otter Co-op.

Building on the dairy’s former retail operation, the feed mill has opened an ice cream parlour in response to locals who didn’t want to lose their favourite hangout.

Chilliwack MLA Dan Coulter, representing the provincial government, noted that technology was a common element helping each business adapt, and underscored the BC NDP’s support for agritech promoting as part of its economic strategy.

“Agritech is going to become an ever more important part of agriculture,” he said.

Related Posts

You may be interested in these posts from the same category.

Chilliwack showcases farm automation

Previous Post: « Plant health centre breaks ground
Next Post: Strong growth for farmland values »

Copyright © 2023 Country Life in BC · All Rights Reserved