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Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:11

Maple syrup a hobby made for self-isolating

Tom Revell loves his maple syrup . . . and he loves making it.

So, when a friend gave him an evaporator back in 2014, he couldn’t wait to fire it up behind his garage on Bauder Lane.

Fast forward to 2018. Revell was starting to get seriously into this new hobby and realized that some of his neighbours were interested as well.

“We went up to Perth and bought this unit,” he said.

The next thing you know, Revell was set up with neighbours Jamie Niedbala, Rob McDougall and Cory Sauve and they were running about 125 taps on 2 kilometres of lines, along with another 85 single taps.

“It’s set up for a sense of community,” he said. “I love the outdoors and I love syrup.

“Never will we make a dime out of it but I don’t care and I love it.

“It’s about big chilli suppers with friends and family.”

Self isolating due underlying health issues of his own, from his job where he works with kids with mental health issues, he’s more or less thrown himself into the syrup-making genre.

“I’ve been in here 12 days out of 13,” he said. “I’ve lost my internet because my kids are back home from university early.

“But I can come out here and listen to music, and even do a little socializing.”

“The socializing is nice too,” said Jamie Niedbala, who is one of Revell’s neighbourhood bandmates in this little endeavour. “I do love being in the outdoors and producing our own food.

“We use the syrup in a lot of baking, marinades, preserving and such.

“Plus it’s a bit of a throwback to earlier times and a sure sign of spring.”

His son, Aidan, who’s now in Grade 8, has seen the operation grow.

“I was pretty young, only four, when it started so pretty much then all I did was follow along,” he said. “But now I’m big enough to carry pails as we still use only buckets because our land is pretty rugged.

“But taking stuff from trees, watching the whole process and now we have it on our tables — It’s cool.”

Revell agrees.

“I built this for fun,” he said. “And it is.

“I love to look back and see kids in the wagon.”

They do sell a bit of syrup here and there (“we even have people coming and asking for it now,” he said) but any money they get goes to pay off the equipment they’ve had to buy.

“This year, we should have gotten all that money back,” he said. “Next year, we’ll be donating a lot of syrup to worthy causes.”

Published in SOUTH FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:10

Food producers react to changing times

Mike Mckenzie of Seed to Sausage saw his sales tumble, overnight, when the restaurant business collapsed two weeks ago, and was subsequently closed entirely. After laying off his hourly employees, he was trying to figure how to find enough work to keep his four salaried employees on the job.

He also participated in a meat processing industry meeting where he was informed by officials from OMAFRA (Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food and Rural Affairs) that meat processing plants must remain operation and ready to produce in case there is an urgent need

“We have access to meat at good prices and we have a supply of our dried sausage as well, so we are opening up the store to sell fresh meat at a good price, and we are starting to do take-out meals as well this week,” he said. “We were busy last weekend with it.”

These are both things that the company was hoping to bring in this summer, but they have come to the forefront now that so much of the business has slowed down.

In addition, Seed to Sausage has approached local food banks and the Ontario Association of Food Banks about providing them with low cost cuts of meat, burgers and sausage, which the company has been doing for some time for the North Frontenac Food Bank.

“We are getting that set up this week. The goal is to help the community out with cheap, high quality meat and meals and keep my salaried staff employed,” Mckenzie said.

Delivery is also something they are working on.

Back Forty Cheese

Jeff and Jenna Fenwick also sell about 80% of the cheese Jeff makes to restaurants across Ontario, and those sales evaporated two weeks ago. While some of their sheep’s milk cheese can keep for a time, some of their softer cheeses have a short shelf life.

They put out a Facebook post offering their cheese to consumers in Eastern Ontario for pickup or delivery and in just a couple of days they managed to sell their inventory.

“We are overwhelmed by the support and are working on getting the logistics of the sales and delivery worked out,” said Jeff from the cheese shop on Tuesday (March 24)

Now he has a decision to make. He can curtail his production or keep producing and hope the sales will continue to roll in. The decision is complicated by the fact that Back Forty regularly purchases most, if not all, of the milk from five small sheep farms in the region, a relationship that Fenwick has been cultivating over several years in order to make sure he has a consistent supply of milk for his cheese factory.

“I don’t want them to have to dump all that milk, especially in the spring when there is so much of it, but it is a risk for me to keep making so much cheese,” he said.

To make things easier, through a mutual friend a web developer has stepped forward to create a fully functioning web-based store for Back Forty Cheese, which is coming online this week.

“Jenna has spent all week getting the orders we got from our web call organised, and this will make that so much easier to manage,” he said, “and he gave me a very good price on it, and then said he would do it for cheese, which is even better.”

Back Forty Cheese is available at Foodsmiths, Seed to Sausage, Local Family Farms, and Glenburnie Groceries, at the farm gate on Gulley Road in Mississippi Station, and as of this week at www.artisancheese.ca

Published in FRONTENAC COUNTY
Wednesday, 25 March 2020 13:09

Activity to try while young kids are home

Here is an activity you can try while kids are home waiting for covid19 to subside.

Try growing some easy vegetables/fruits from scraps. This activity and may spark your child’s interest in gardening.

Some of the easier vegetables you try from scraps are: Romaine lettuce, celery, green onions.

Romaine lettuce, onions, celery : take the stump cut about 1-2 inches from the end of the vegetable. Fill a container halfway with water, set the stump side down in water, please in a sunny window and watch for new growth, which will start within a few days. Change the water every couple of days. For those of you on town water, keep some water on hand that has sat for at least a day to reduce the chemicals that would have been added to water. After about 3 weeks I could will see new roots start to appear on my lettuce. At this point when roots are a few inch long you can place it in soil water and continue to watch it grow. Or cut off the small amount of lettuce which did regrow and enjoy.

Hopefully during this time your kids would have been excited with watching the regrowth occur.

Have fun and stay safe.

Written by Judy Wall A member of the Lanark County Master Gardeners.

Photo taken by Judy Wall

Published in Master Gardeners

If you were sitting in Sharbot Lake Saturday afternoon, you might have thought there’s no way they’re going to get the Parham Fair in today, what with the torrential downpour.

But, while it rained in Parham too (albeit not quite as heavy), a little rain isn’t enough to stop a party that’s been going on for 127 years.

“It wasn’t a real heavy rain,” said Lois Webster, who was selling raffle tickets for St. James Anglican Church when the skies were drizzling. “They sure didn’t stop judging the livestock.”

“It was kinda slow during the rain but we carried on,” said Fair Vice-president Carol Wagar. “We had a great horse draw, with 18 teams.

“And after 2 p.m., it was nice and we had a lot of great kids games.”

And other than the demolition derby, which may have set an attendance record Sunday afternoon, much of the Fair is for kids.

For example, there was the best dressed cowboy/cowgirl contest followed by a host of pet competitions ranging from what dog can sit the longest (won by Paige Hole and Mika the beagle) to most unusual pet (Maddy Tryon and her unnamed chicken with one extra toe.).

Heck, even two-week old Addison Hole got into the act with Mika).

Hallie Hearns won the turtle race with her turtle Gus.

In all, there were about 30 different pet competitions with the Tryon family establishing something of a dynasty in the events.

“We’re passing the torch,” said Maddy Tryon. “This is the first year our sister Katie was too old to compete.”

But who won really doesn’t matter, it was clear the kids were having a ball with their pets.

And it’s been that way for quite some time, as there is very much a generational aspect to the Parham Fair.

“My grandparents used to help out with the fair,” said Savannah Cronk, overseer of the pet competitions.

Cronk is now at teacher at Land O’Lakes Public School, but she has a long history with the fair.

“I used to be the frog jumping champion,” she said. “And I was the Cherry Pie Princess and champion cow caller.”

Although, not everybody gets involved because of family ties . . . or do they?

“It was because they asked me to,” said Margie McCullough, who served as announcer for the kids events. “But I love it. It’s my home town.

“You get to see people you haven’t seen in awhile and meet a lot of new people.”

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC

Central Frontenac Township kicked off the first of three open houses on the revisiting of its Official Plan (mandated by Provincial Law) last week in Sharbot Lake with an information session on Waterfront Development Policies. Subsequent open houses on Settlement Areas and Growth Management and Rural Areas and Agriculture are planned on following Wednesdays.

About 50 people including staff and four members of Central Frontenac Council.

“This is a complete overhaul of the Official Plan,” said Frontenac County Manager of Community Planning Megan Rueckwald, who also serves as Central Frontenac’s planner. “It will be more comprehensive and not just for waterfront areas.”

One proposal is to reduce the minimum lot size to 2 acres (0.8 hectares) from the current 2.47 acres (1 hectare).

“But there will be other measures introduced to deal with character and density along the waterfronts,” she said. “For example, there is work on backlanes and a 30-metre setback has been solidified.

“Also there are new policies to govern lot coverage within 60 metres (200 feet) of the high water mark.”

As well, there are specific sections to govern the Garrison Shores development and the fish culture station at White Lake.

Rueckwald said they plan to bring a report to a Council meeting in September summarizing the feedback they receive.

However, she said there is a new Provincial Policy Statement expected in October and any final changes to the Official Plan will likely wait until it comes out, in order to be consistent with the PPS and Frontenac County Official Plan.

So, there’s still plenty of time to have your say.

The third and final open house is scheduled for Aug. 28 at 6 p.m. in Sharbot Lake’s Oso Hall.

Or you can contact Rueckwald directly at 613-548-9400 ext. 351 or This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC

There were “a few changes over the winter” to the Frontenac Farmers Market and as such, interim manager Mark Revelle didn’t have many plans to reveal concerning any special events this summer.

“We’re having a meeting after the market to elect a president, treasurer and manager,” he said. “We’re still planning on going through Thanksgiving.

“Hopefully, we’ll all have fun and make things grow.”

The market runs Saturdays from 9am to 2pm through Thanksgiving and features local produce, meats, baked goods and crafts.

“It’s been surprisingly busy,” Revelle said of the opening day. “That’s mainly because of the sun.”

One new vendor this year was enjoying meeting people on a sunny Saturday.

Bailey Gurr said she and her husband have been operating a sugar bush on Buck Lake near Westport for some time now and things have been growing.

“We started out as a hobby, my husband has been tapping trees since he was 12 and in 2018, we had our first year producing more than 400 litres of syrup,” she said. “We don’t have enough friends and family to give it all away to.

“So, we’re just getting started in business.

“We have syrup and candy and we’ll have maple butter when I make some.”

Published in SOUTH FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 15 May 2019 10:10

Local children enjoy Farm Fresh Fun

A special event designed for young children was a big hit in Sunbury on May 8.

Held at Ormsbee’s Mercantile, children were invited to play with rabbits, plant a seed and sample maple syrup.

“This is our sixth year doing the event,” says Jenn Ormsbee, 39. “The whole idea is to bring our community together. It’s nice to see the kids having a great time.”

Looking around the parking lot where children of all ages looked busy and happy, Ormsbee admits she is pleased with the event that is part of the United Way of KFL&A Success by Six campaign.

Speaking on behalf of the Frontenac 4-H, which represented local, future farmers, volunteer leader Amey Brooks notes, “This is really for the kids. It’s all about community.”

According to Brooks, 4-H members attended from the rabbit & cavy club (guinea pigs) and clover buds to promote community involvement and the benefits of becoming a 4-H member.

“One of the big things in 4-H is community,” says Brooks, who has a 13-year-old daughter in the 15-member rabbit club. “This type of event will also help our members with their public speaking skills and give them an opportunity to proudly show-off their rabbits. This type of event helps more kids get involved.”

After this event, the rabbit club will be showing/jumping its rabbits at the Odessa Fair in July and the Kingston Fall Fair in September.

“Who knew I would be driving around with rabbit jumps in my van all summer,” says Brooks with a smile.

 

To learn more about 4H, please go to https://www.4-hontario.ca/4h-in-my-area/frontenac.aspx

To learn more about Success by Six, go to www.unitedwaykfla.ca/programs/success-by-6/

Published in SOUTH FRONTENAC
Wednesday, 08 May 2019 16:13

Rose - the Queen of the Flowers

A rose is one of the most beautiful flowers in the garden and in bouquets. It is also one of the oldest plant species with fossil remains that indicate it was around in primitive form over 32 million years.

The best time to plant roses is in the spring, as early as possible and as soon as the frost is out of the ground. Roses thrive best in full sun but six hours daily is also satisfactory. The soil should be well drained, with no competition from tree roots. Roses will do well in clay soil or other types, as long as a good amount of organic matter is worked into the soil. Well-rotted manure can also improve the soil as well as peat moss and bone meal. Roses are very heavy feeders and organic matter adds to the moisture retaining quality of the soil. The holes should be dug large and deep enough so the roots can be spread out easily. The union or crown should be at or 5 cm below the surface of the ground. Plant your new rose immediately to keep it from drying out. If you must delay planting, place the rose bush in a bucket of water for a few days.

Once roses are established and growing well, top dress with compost and work some granular fertilizer into the soil. Apply liquid fertilizer mixed with water, according to package directions every week until August 1st. Prune at planting time by cutting back the tops, leaving only three strong branches 12-15 cm above the ground. Remove any broken or crossing branches. Roses that receive good nourishment and are well cared for are least prone to disease.

Many varieties of roses are available in gorgeous solid and bicolours. To protect your roses in winter, mound up the soil around them. To prevent mice and rodents from overwintering around your roses, mound shredded leaves or straw around them once the ground has frozen.

There are many types of roses and an infinite number of varieties available:

Tender Rose Types (require some form of winter protection)

• Floribunda means the abundance of flowers. These roses bloom with clusters of flowers from early summer until the first killing frost. They are hardier than Hybrid Tea Roses but may still need winter protection.

• Hybrid Tea Roses have large flowers and long pointed flower buds and usually produce only one flower per stem. They have a large range of colour and bloom almost continuously, making them a valued cut flower. They require a great deal of winter protection.

• Grandiflora means large flowers. These roses have large flower in small clusters. They are a cross between Floribunda and Hybrid Teas and are good for cutting.

• Miniature Roses look like smaller versions of hybrid teas and most varieties bloom all summer. They are ideal for containers and can be used as a house plant in a sunny window. Hardy Rose Types (Can survive cold winters without protection)

• Explorer Series developed by Agriculture Canada to survive Canadian winters. They can be in the form of low ground covers to shrubs and climbers

• Rugosa Roses have recurrent fragrant blooms with clean healthy foliage. They are available as species and hybrids. They grow as dense shrubs and some varieties sucker to form a spreading colony. Virtually disease and pest free.

• Old Garden Roses or antique roses are known for their stunningly beautiful, fragrant flowers. This is a loose grouping that includes roses that have been cultivated for centuries. They are tough and robust.

• Parkland Series were developed by Agriculture Canada at the research station in Morden Manitoba. They were bred specifically for prairie conditions by crossing native prairie roses with hybrid tea roses. Most varieties bloom repeatedly until frost after an initial first flush.

Margaret Inwood is a member of the Lanark County Master Gardeners. Want to know more about the group or ask a gardening question? Visit our website at www.lanarkmg. blogspot.com or contact us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Published in Master Gardeners
Wednesday, 01 May 2019 11:24

Growing Tips

My seed orders have arrived and some seeds are already growing , but as I wait impatiently for the real spring to arrive I have browsed once more through seed catalogues and realized just how much information is in them. Not only do seed companies offer dozens more varieties than local stores can carry, the catalogues contain germination guides ,excellent photos , culture tips, diseases and pests to watch for, and nifty gadgets and tools to make your gardening easier. I pass along some of the good growing tips that I have gleaned from Johnny’s Selected seeds, Vesey’s, and Wm. Dam Seed.

Go ahead and gamble. Early beans are worth the risk. It’s true that beans hate frost. But a “cheater” row of beans planted two weeks before the last frost date is worth the risk. If they aren’t nipped by frost, you have moved ahead your bean harvest. If they do get hit with frost, you have lost nothing more than a few seeds and can replant.

Use care when harvesting asparagus to avoid damage to spears that have yet to emerge. Remove dead ferns in fall to help prevent asparagus beetle infestation.

Early maturing cabbage varieties may split or burst at maturity from rapid new growth if heavy rain follows a dry spell. Splitting may be partly avoided by slowing growth. To accomplish this, cultivate close to plants to sever some of the root system, or by slightly twisting the plant.

When planting in dry or windy weather, sow the seed in moist soil, then cover with a wide board to retain the moisture until the seeds germinate. Then remove it. This works very well with succession plantings of salad crops.

Hot peppers are becoming popular in home gardens and they come in many shapes, sizes flavours and heat. Measured in Scovilles, peppers range from mild to blistering hot. Jalapenos are in the 25005000 range while Habenero peppers can range up to 500,000 (not for the faint of heart)

To prevent and control tomato diseases use varieties that are noted as disease resistant, do not grow tomatoes where there have been tomatoes, peppers, potatoes or eggplant for at least three years, do not overcrowd, water in the morning or use drip irrigation, and mulch to retain soil moisture.

Monarch caterpillars eat only milkweed during their life, but the adult butterflies have a more varied diet that includes aster, buddleja, echinacea, verbena and zinnia. Butterflies like flowers that give them a platform to hold on to while they sip nectar, such as achillea, rudbeckia, tithonia, and zinnias. Bees love broccoli. Leave some of your cole crops to bolt to provide a month of food for bees.

If deer are hungry, they will eat almost anything, but here is a list of plants they will avoid until that point: ageratum, aster, borage, cleome, foxglove, marigolds, poppies, rosemary, salvia, thyme, verbena and zinnia.

In a year of extreme heat and drought, gardeners often look to grow plants that can survive arid conditions. These include agastache, celosia, cosmos, dusty miller, gomphrena, lavender, marigold, portulaca sage, sedum and vinca.

Written by Helen Hallpenny who is a member of the Lanark County Master Gardeners. Want to know more about the Master Gardeners group or ask a gardening question? Visit our website at www.lanarkmg.blogspot. com or contact us at lanarkmg@ gmail.com

Published in Master Gardeners
Monday, 01 April 2019 16:04

Oso Sweet Maple Syrup

Clayton Conboy grew up helping his Mom and Dad, Joyce and Mel, make maple syrup each spring. It was a labour-intensive effort, tromping out to the bush, gathering sap from holding tanks around their farm property on Bell Line road, which is off the 509 north of Sharbot Lake, and hauling it to the evaporator to be boiled down into syrup.

Clayton is now 31, and works in Ottawa, but he looks forward to coming home during syrup season. The family syrup operation, which is called Oso Sweet, a play on the former name of the township where their farm is located, has developed significantly over the years.

All of the sap now flows from the bush into a central shed, thanks to a vacuum system. It goes through preliminary filtering, and is then pumped into a 2,800 gallon stainless steel tank that is housed in a new building. The sap then passes into a reverse osmosis machine, where, through the use of air pressure and microfiltration, the sugar content of the sap is tripled. The Conboys bring their sap to 7.5% sugar before sending off it to the wood fired evaporator where it is transformed to maple syrup, precisely 67% sugar. Even elements such as the barometric reading are taken into account. The finished syrup is filtered, graded as golden, amber, or dark and then bottled for sale.

“The best syrup is made from the freshest sap, and with all that we’ve done over the years, when the sap is running well, we can process it into syrup pretty quickly,” said Mel Conboy, in an interview at the farm last Friday, a cool early spring day when the trees “weren’t really hurting themselves to run that much” as Clayton Conboy put it.

The other advantage of the technology that the Conboys have put in place over the last ten years or so, is that instead of boiling well into the night when the sap is running hard, they can be finished and becleaned up by supper time.

“I’m 68,” said Mel, “I don’t need to work until midnight anymore.”

Putting in the reverse osmosis machine cut the boiling time for syrup significantly, saving on wood and lessening the environmental impact of syrup production. But it was not just a matter of buying a machine. It required the construction of a new heated building, which took time and money. When the Conboy’s were ready to make the purchase, they applied for, and received, an Eastern Ontario Development Program grant.

With the cost of the reverse osmosis machine, the building and hydro upgrades, we were very appreciative of the grant that we received from the Frontenac CFDC. It helped fund a project that we had long dreamed of, covering about 10% of the cost. That was a big help,” said Joyce Conboy.

The Conboys are planning still more upgrades, in a constant effort to create an efficient operation that produces consistent, high quality maple syrup.

They purchased a new finish filter machine this year, and in the long term would like to build on to the new building to house their evaporator and bring their entire production into one space. As well, as they increase their capacity to process sap into syrup, they are looking at expanding by tapping some more of their maple. They are already producing as much syrup out of 1,600 taps as they used to produce from 3,000, and by expanding they can start to make more syrup than ever before. But nothing is simple. Even with automation, syrup season is a busy time of year at the Conboy farm. Lined need to be checked, the sugar bush monitored, and the technology has to work in harmony, one malfunction and the entire system is challenged. And the wood for the evaporator doesn’t cut, split, and dry itself.

“We love this time of year. It’s like a breath of fresh air and the end result is uniquely Canadian,” said Joyce.

Oso sweet syrup is available at the farm gate at 2379 Bell Line Road, and in Ottawa through Clayton’s home store. Check their website Ososweetmaple.ca. They are participating in Maple Weekend on April 6 and 7 as well, one of two Frontenac County locations, which are both located on the Bell Line Road.

Published in CENTRAL FRONTENAC
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With the participation of the Government of Canada