Plowing Match heads east

BY CHRISTINE PEETS

Kicking off Sept. 13 at 7 p.m. with an inter-faith celebration featuring music from churches across Frontenac county, the 1998 International Plowing Match, says chairman Ken Keyes, promises to "bring together the best of urban and rural societies."

Following the official opening on Sept.15, here's what visitors can expect to find.

Family Lifestyles, in six tents, includes the Quilting Parlour, where you'll be able to see the three quilts put together from 90 entries in the Frontenac County competition. They'll be raffled off at the end of the IPM.

Family Lifestyles also features the Plowmen's Pantry, food demonstrations, fashion shows, and a child care tent and play area. Parents can leave kids between ages 3 and 7 at the centre for up to two hours.

In the Craft Barn, various works of arts and crafts will be on show and for sale.

Between 500 and 600 exhibitors will set up in the Tented City. Representatives from farm machinery dealers, agri-businesses, local conservation authorities and provincial parks will be on hand to discuss their programs and products.

"Everyone from maple syrup producers to tractor dealers will be there," says Barb Shipp of the Ontario Plowmen's Association.

There will be food vendors on site, and the Storrington Lions Club will be providing breakfasts, dinners and evening bar service between Sept. 8 and 18.

Special events include team penning, sheep dog trials, weaving demonstrations and, of course, plowing.

Fewer than five percent of the expected 150,000 visitors will actually go to the six plowing fields to see the plowing over the five days of the match. Those who do, however, can expect to see fierce competition among the 150 entrants vying for prize money expected to exceed $35,000.

Celebrity plowing will take place throughout the event.

© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back

Cream of cream tasters reflects on prize-winning days

There aren't many people in this country who have tasted as much fresh cream as Dave Daly - without drinking a drop.

Daly grew up on a farm in Egremont township, Grey county, before starting in 1940 to work at the Canada Packer's creamery in Mount Forest. The two-man creamery was located around behind Tom Padfield's grocery store on Main Street.

One of Daly's jobs at the Packers was to taste as many as 100 cans of cream arriving at the loading dock each day. His taste buds won several provincial competitions, and in 1957 he took home two of the four trophies awarded by the Ontario Creamery Association for the best butter quality in Ontario.

Forty years later he is still as proud as ever of his work and his awards. "You had to have everything as clean as you could have it," he recalls. "They had what they called 'yeast and mould tests.' We sent a sample down each week to be measured for cleanliness.

"Tasting cream was like tasting wine," Daly says. "You let it go back as far as you can to the taste buds...and then spit it out."

It wasn't quite as simple then as it is now for farmers to keep their cream pure while awaiting shipment to town. Rats, spoons, a baby shoe and an overshoe were all among the extras Daly recalls pulling from various cream cans over the years. The contaminated cream was marked with butter colour before being returned to the farmer: The idea was to help ease the temptation to try to resell it to another creamery.

"One time we got a weasel," Daly chuckles. "Jack McKenzie took the thing downstairs and skinned it."

Then there was a lady's wrist watch. They took it up to Jack Philps the jeweler to see if he knew whose it was. Sure enough, he did, and the woman got her watch back. "I even think it worked," Daly adds.

Daly started out at Canada Packers washing cream cans, and for a short time did a little chicken plucking in a garage located at the rear of the creamery. The pay was two cents per chicken, "and if you got an old pinny hen, I tell you that was your morning's work."

Daly learned butter making under Mac Campbell, an expert butter maker and a dear friend. There were other helpers in the creamery, but Dave and Mac churned out over a ton of fresh butter each day during the summer, about half as much in the winter.

Work started at 7 or 8 a.m. with no set hours. They worked until the work was done. On Wednesdays and Saturdays when the downtown stores stayed open late, farmers kept bringing cream into the dairy until 10 p.m. Saturday night was pay night for the farmers, too.

There was no refrigeration, and the cream couldn't be left sitting out overnight waiting to be processed. The creamery used ice cut from the millpond to cool the cream overnight to be ready for butter making first thing the next morning.

"I sure enjoyed it," Daly says. "It was clean work. There were so many different jobs...meeting people...it broke up the day. It was good work."

Dave Daly retired from the Packers in 1980. The picture of him receiving his butter award still proudly sits in his living room.
Campbell Cork lives and writes in Mount Forest

© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back

Ballpark frank-ness, meaningful chat

The Canadian Wheat Board has some friends in strange places. While many Prairie farmers have been trying to extricate themselves from the marketing monopoly, the Ottawa Citizen reports North Dakota governor Ed Schafer recently met with wheat board officials to discuss whether the state's farmers could sell through the board. The North Dakota Farmers Union argues that the board could earn Dakota farmers an extra US 60 cents per bushel.

Wheat board commissioner Richard Klassen says the board is giving the matter serious consideration. He says there would be many obstacles to overcome, but noted that the wheat board has offered North Dakota farmers help in establishing their own marketing board.

Here's a farm joke making it's way around law office e-mail.

A farmer walks into an attorney's office wanting to file for a divorce. The attorney asks, "May I help you?" The farmer says, "Yup, I want one of those dayvorces."
The attorney says, "Well, do you have any grounds?" The farmer replies, "Yea, I got about 140 acres." The attorney says, "No, you don't understand, do you have a case?" The farmer says, "No, I don't have a Case, but I have a New Holland."
The attorney says, "No, you don't understand, I mean do you have a grudge?" The farmer says, "Yea, I got a grudge, that's where I park my New Holland."
The attorney says, "No sir, I mean do you have a suit?" The farmer replies, "Yes sir, I have a suit. I wear it to church on Sundays."
Exasperated, the attorney says, "Well sir, does your wife beat you up or anything?"
The farmer says, "No sir, we both get up at about 4:30."
Finally, the attorney says, "OK, let me put it this way. "WHY DO YOU WANT A DIVORCE?"
And the farmer says, "Well, I can never have a meaningful conversation with her."

Biotechnology took another thumping last month when scientist Arpad Puztai of Scotland's Rowett Institute claimed rats fed genetically modified potatoes suffered from damaged immune systems and exhibited stunted growth.
The day Reuters reported the story it was picked up by at least 33 TV stations in the U.S. The following day the Biotechnology Industry Organization, a coalition of biotech companies, was busy doing damage control.
The task was made somewhat easier when Puztai was suspended by the Institute after scientists took a closer look at his study.
Andrew Chesson, a senior scientist at Rowett, told Reuters that Puztai's claims could not be substantiated by his data: "We have been misled by a very senior scientist at this institute."
The Puztai claim was front page news in Britain and prompted politicians to call for a moratorium on the sale of all genetically modified foods.

While baseball fans focus on the run to smash Roger Maris's single-season dinger record, the guy who hit the most in a career - Hank Aaron - is in ballpark news, too. Turns out PETA was describing the Hall of Famer as a vegetarian to promote its veggie burgers at ballparks. He's not. Aaron - who owns Arby's beef and Church's chicken restaurants - says the matter "is in my attorney's hands," reports OFAC's summer 1998 FAC's newsletter.

© copyright 1998 Agricultural Publishing Company Limited.


back