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In anticipation of Canada’s sesquicentennial celebrations, the Citizen’s Bruce Deachman has been out in search of Ottawans — 150 of them — to learn their stories of life and death, hope and love, the exceptional and the everyday. We’ll share one person’s story every day until Canada Day.
“My dad’s grandfather, Charles Acres, bought this farm in 1920, and then my grandfather, Gordon Acres, started farming here in the 1930s; milking cows and selling eggs. My dad was one of two boys, and he came home to farm — he was in Hydro and got injured twice in a short period of time, and they said, ‘OK, I think you’d better find something else to do’ — so dad came home in the early ’50s. My uncle was supposed to take over the farm, but he got a job at the Experimental Farm.
“I think dad took over in the early 1970s. I’m one of four daughters. I graduated from Kemptville College in 1987 — did the dairy program. So I came home in ’87 and I’ve been farming ever since.
“Times are changing and there are a lot of women taking over the family farm, but their husbands are home full-time. I think that’s the difference with me; my husband is a full-time firefighter with the City of Ottawa. When he’s off, he’s definitely involved. And I didn’t even know when we started dating that he had an agriculture background. His grandparents had a farm, in Manotick Station, and he had two uncles that dairy farmed. So it was in the blood. But Robert’s not a cow man; he’s really good at fixing stuff, which I am not, and my daughter and I primarily milk. And I do have part-timers that help so I can have a day off here and there.
“Being a woman, I did have some negativity from some outside people, like a veterinarian, a feed company and salespeople, when I started farming in 1987, but not from farmers. I’ve always been treated fairly. I used to go to a meeting 20 years ago and there’d be hardly any women in the room. But that has definitely changed. There are girls coming home to farm. But I think that Jasmine and I are the only mother-daughter. She graduated from Kemptville College three years ago and she’s home with me full-time. Our son Travis is around, but he wants to be a firefighter like dad. He’s not a cow man at all. So the hope is that Jasmine will take over the farm.
“We have about 160 head of cattle, 80 of which are milking. So we milk 80 cows twice a day. And we run between 400 and 450 acres of crop, which primarily feeds our cattle. On a good year we’ll have a little bit of crop to sell.
“I love animals. I never get tired of a newborn calf. And I really enjoy milking the cows early in the morning — getting up and starting the day when everybody’s battling traffic to get into Ottawa. I do enjoy my commute to the barn. It’s about a 20-second walk.
“It is not an easy life. The cows dictate your day, there’s no doubt about that. We milk at 5:30 in the morning and 4:30 in the afternoon, so those are set times. But by the same token, when my kids were growing up I could take off and volunteer for an hour or two once a week. I could schedule that into my day. You go for groceries when you want; you don’t have to wait till you’re dog-tired at the end of the day. I guess I like the small freedoms that you get.
“But I really like the cattle, I really do. I did work in customer service for an electronics company between Grade 12 and my first year of college. I worked with people, and that wasn’t for me. Customer service is a tough job — I always have sympathy for cashiers and Tim Hortons workers, I really do.
“And as hard as this job is, cattle are really easy to please. They just want to be milked and fed, and they don’t give you sass. They don’t complain that you’re 10 minutes late or that their feed is late because of a frozen silo. Generally, I find animals easy to please. And they have personalities. People on the whole think that cows are stupid. I follow Farmer Tim on Facebook, and on his farm they milk 40 cows and he has them all trained to go into their own stalls. So they’re trainable — cows are very trainable.
“You’ll have the cow that’s eager to get milked, so she’s standing there looking for me as I’m working my way down in the morning. She’ll bawl until I get there and get the milker on her. And there are some that love attention; there’s one who’ll just about lick the coat off you when you walk by. Jasmine calls her our puppy dog.
“Some of them don’t really care. They’re just like, ‘Feed me. Milk me.’ But there are some who are characters. And they’re all registered so they all get names. I name them when they’re babies. This one here is called Sumo, and when we started milking her, my daughter said we should have never called her Sumo because she was so rough and didn’t want to be bothered. And I once named a calf Lucky and she died, so you have to be careful.
“I know the names of the majority of them. Before I turned 50, I knew them all. My son brought a friend home and said, ‘Mom, he doesn’t believe that you know all the cows’ names.’ So I went around and I think that day I missed two out of 75. But it’s no different than a high-school teacher knowing three classes of kids’ names. You work with them seven days a week, you just get to know them.
“But you are very tied to the farm, and I’m better than I used to be. I’ve got two farmer friends and one’s just quit. He’s 52 and his back is done. So I figure if I could take at least a day off — there are some weeks now where I can take a second day, which is usually filled with paperwork — and one week a year we take off now, for sure. But it took me a long time to get comfortable with that. I think that’s because my dad never did; that wasn’t a priority for the older generation. Robert and I, from the second year we were married till we were 20 years married, we never had a week by ourselves. But now, at 20 years, we try to book a holiday. But we’re our own worst enemies for not stopping, and when you’re off, you’re not off. You’re always on call.”
— Janet Acres Smiley. Manotick, March 3, 2017.
bdeachman@postmedia.com
查看原文...
“My dad’s grandfather, Charles Acres, bought this farm in 1920, and then my grandfather, Gordon Acres, started farming here in the 1930s; milking cows and selling eggs. My dad was one of two boys, and he came home to farm — he was in Hydro and got injured twice in a short period of time, and they said, ‘OK, I think you’d better find something else to do’ — so dad came home in the early ’50s. My uncle was supposed to take over the farm, but he got a job at the Experimental Farm.
“I think dad took over in the early 1970s. I’m one of four daughters. I graduated from Kemptville College in 1987 — did the dairy program. So I came home in ’87 and I’ve been farming ever since.
“Times are changing and there are a lot of women taking over the family farm, but their husbands are home full-time. I think that’s the difference with me; my husband is a full-time firefighter with the City of Ottawa. When he’s off, he’s definitely involved. And I didn’t even know when we started dating that he had an agriculture background. His grandparents had a farm, in Manotick Station, and he had two uncles that dairy farmed. So it was in the blood. But Robert’s not a cow man; he’s really good at fixing stuff, which I am not, and my daughter and I primarily milk. And I do have part-timers that help so I can have a day off here and there.
“Being a woman, I did have some negativity from some outside people, like a veterinarian, a feed company and salespeople, when I started farming in 1987, but not from farmers. I’ve always been treated fairly. I used to go to a meeting 20 years ago and there’d be hardly any women in the room. But that has definitely changed. There are girls coming home to farm. But I think that Jasmine and I are the only mother-daughter. She graduated from Kemptville College three years ago and she’s home with me full-time. Our son Travis is around, but he wants to be a firefighter like dad. He’s not a cow man at all. So the hope is that Jasmine will take over the farm.
“We have about 160 head of cattle, 80 of which are milking. So we milk 80 cows twice a day. And we run between 400 and 450 acres of crop, which primarily feeds our cattle. On a good year we’ll have a little bit of crop to sell.
“I love animals. I never get tired of a newborn calf. And I really enjoy milking the cows early in the morning — getting up and starting the day when everybody’s battling traffic to get into Ottawa. I do enjoy my commute to the barn. It’s about a 20-second walk.
“It is not an easy life. The cows dictate your day, there’s no doubt about that. We milk at 5:30 in the morning and 4:30 in the afternoon, so those are set times. But by the same token, when my kids were growing up I could take off and volunteer for an hour or two once a week. I could schedule that into my day. You go for groceries when you want; you don’t have to wait till you’re dog-tired at the end of the day. I guess I like the small freedoms that you get.
“But I really like the cattle, I really do. I did work in customer service for an electronics company between Grade 12 and my first year of college. I worked with people, and that wasn’t for me. Customer service is a tough job — I always have sympathy for cashiers and Tim Hortons workers, I really do.
“And as hard as this job is, cattle are really easy to please. They just want to be milked and fed, and they don’t give you sass. They don’t complain that you’re 10 minutes late or that their feed is late because of a frozen silo. Generally, I find animals easy to please. And they have personalities. People on the whole think that cows are stupid. I follow Farmer Tim on Facebook, and on his farm they milk 40 cows and he has them all trained to go into their own stalls. So they’re trainable — cows are very trainable.
“You’ll have the cow that’s eager to get milked, so she’s standing there looking for me as I’m working my way down in the morning. She’ll bawl until I get there and get the milker on her. And there are some that love attention; there’s one who’ll just about lick the coat off you when you walk by. Jasmine calls her our puppy dog.
“Some of them don’t really care. They’re just like, ‘Feed me. Milk me.’ But there are some who are characters. And they’re all registered so they all get names. I name them when they’re babies. This one here is called Sumo, and when we started milking her, my daughter said we should have never called her Sumo because she was so rough and didn’t want to be bothered. And I once named a calf Lucky and she died, so you have to be careful.
“I know the names of the majority of them. Before I turned 50, I knew them all. My son brought a friend home and said, ‘Mom, he doesn’t believe that you know all the cows’ names.’ So I went around and I think that day I missed two out of 75. But it’s no different than a high-school teacher knowing three classes of kids’ names. You work with them seven days a week, you just get to know them.
“But you are very tied to the farm, and I’m better than I used to be. I’ve got two farmer friends and one’s just quit. He’s 52 and his back is done. So I figure if I could take at least a day off — there are some weeks now where I can take a second day, which is usually filled with paperwork — and one week a year we take off now, for sure. But it took me a long time to get comfortable with that. I think that’s because my dad never did; that wasn’t a priority for the older generation. Robert and I, from the second year we were married till we were 20 years married, we never had a week by ourselves. But now, at 20 years, we try to book a holiday. But we’re our own worst enemies for not stopping, and when you’re off, you’re not off. You’re always on call.”
— Janet Acres Smiley. Manotick, March 3, 2017.
bdeachman@postmedia.com
查看原文...
