n THE CARILLON STEINBACH, MAN. C2
n www.thecarillon.com THURSDAY, AUGUST 8, 2024
WES KEATING THE CARILLON
Harvey and Karen Enns have been growing saskatoons on three acres of their Grunthal area farm since 2011.
There’s always next year for optimistic producers
by WES KEATING T he formula for success for any scientific experiment, or per- haps even for the invention of a better mousetrap, is to follow the same steps for each experiment until those steps produce the same satisfactory result time after time. A Grunthal area berry producer found out this year that formula doesn’t apply to farming, especially when it comes to growing saskatoons. Harvey and Karen Enns are at a loss to explain why their crop of sas- katoons this year did not live up to expectations. The berries certainly were of good quality, Harvey says. There just weren’t enough of them. In fact, regular pickers who look forward to visiting Rock Creek Sas- katoons every year were just as dis- appointed as Harvey and Karen. The couple did not open their farm as a U-pick this year, as they had picked all the available berries themselves during two weeks in July. The couple says they did every- thing the same as ever, and the weather was good, but the bumper crop they enjoyed last year just didn’t materialize. Although they are disappointed, Harvey and Karen are looking forward to a better crop next year. And the Grunthal fruit growers are certainly not alone, and by the sec- ond week in July, they had heard of other producers who didn’t have suf- ficient saskatoons to open a U-pick this year. One of the larger producers at Gross Isle shut down their U-pick for the first time in 12 years this season. There certainly have been ups and downs for Harvey and Karen since they planted 3,000 saskatoon bush- es back in 2011, but this year’s poor crop came as a complete surprise. When the couple decided to make a three-acre orchard part of their Grunthal farm, they chose Smokies and Northline varieties, in antici- pation of an extended picking sea- son. Smokies tend to produce fruit a week earlier than Northline, Harvey explains, and that means an extra week of picking. Except for this year, he added ruefully.
WES KEATING THE CARILLON Harvey says their owl is not the high tech model that moves its head to scare away birds, but it still does the job and they have suffered very little bird damage to the berry patch over the years.
while yet. While they shifted their efforts to growing fruit in 2011, Harvey en- joys a long history with the Grunthal farm. They have lived on the yard since 2005, and Harvey grew up on the family farm half a mile south, where they had hogs and cattle.
mixes the two kinds of saskatoons in his basket. If Rock Creek Saskatoons were to plant replacements in their berry patch in the future, he would stick to Northline Harvey says. And while they have no plans for expansion, the Ennses agree they may just put off retirement for a
Harvey says he bought this farm as a young man while living in Winni- peg and working for Canadian Na- tional Railways, until 2010. Karen grew up in Winnipeg, but also comes from a family with a farm back- ground.
The Northline is a sweeter berry and most customers prefer to pick it, after sampling both. Customers go back and forth to sample the two va- rieties and some stay with the Smok- ies, wanting that more tart flavour for jam. When Harvey picks, he says he goes from one side to the other and
See ‘Bumper crop’ on 3C
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