The post-conference tour is coming to a close with a visit to Prince Edward Island today and has proved to be physically tiring as the roads of Quebec and the bus used by the tour company have not proven to be compatible. With just 15 on the tour a change from the coach used in the first week was expected, but the bone shaker chozen has left us exhausted at the end of some long days. The Australians and New Zealanders have remained on tour with 3 from England, two different couples from the US and Rob Forster from Canada.
On leaving Toronto we have followed the St Lawrence seaway/river east, the seaway was opened in 1959 as a result of a joint Canadian/US project and the creation of several locks to bipass the Niagara Falls and at further points to the west opened up navigation to the great Lakes and the centre of North America. Our first destination was Montreal and this city has an extensive series of underground stores etc, which allows the citizens tom avoid the worst of the winter weather. The guide who was very good, stated that “you can be born in the underground hospital, go to school underground, go to work underground, die underground before being finally buried underground”. The most impressive works were the excavation and underpinning of the magnificent Cathedral from beneath which you suddenly emerge back to street level.
Our first farm visit was to the Mason family, who in addition to their dairy cows, also harvest and refine Maple Syrup from trees on the farm. This is an industry that is based almost entirely in Quebec with 80% of the world’s Maple Syrup collected there. The industry has embraced new technology with groups of five to ten trees linked by plastic tubing and the whole network is connected to a pipeline that is controlled by a vacumn pump back at the farm which delivers the syrup to a stainless steel tank, whereafter filtering it is heated and the majority of the water is evaporated to leave the syrup. The “season” is short and is weather dependant with the difference between day and night temperatures being critical as this controls the “rising of the sap”, but once the trees are in full leaf the season ends. The Masons have 4000 Maple trees in the woods at the back of the farm in production and the main problem is damage from squirrells who find the plastic piping irresistable. The syrup is delivered in plastic 20 gallon drums to a wholesaler who deals with the bottling and retail sales with production at present sold to China and the USA.
The dairy herd of about 40 cows are milked and housed in a tie stall which has recently been extended and now has a new slurry pit to which the muck from the shed is delivered through an underground pipe into which it is forced by a large piston. This has ended the daily chore of muck spreading in particular through the winter months and has allowed the muck to be saved for the Maize crop which was the most impressive seen on the trip. The Mason’s are having a frustrating time in trying to build Guernsey numbers and have only three milking cows in the herd, they have tried without much success to use embryo transfer and have now started crossing Guernsey bulls on to the Holsteins. There was a three quarter bred calf by Yogibear that caught the eye, but the one pure bred calf by Turley also impressed. There were six cross bred heifers either in calf or ready to serve and these were also judged by our “international” teams and Rob Forster competing as the sole Canadian established an early lead.
In addition to the Guernseys, the Mason’s are also trying to increase numbers of the Canadienne breed, this breed emerged from Criss Crossing of the original breeds imported by the mainly French settlers.
The Brown Swiss has been introduced in recent years and there was an impressive calf to be seen in the calf house.
We then travelled to Quebec City the home of driver Claude, who having been away from home for a fortnight with a previous tour before picking us up in Toronto had forgotten that our arrival co-incided with the last night of the Quebec festival and thus the city was gridlocked! Eventually we gained access to our hotel and on reaching the sixteenth floor were greeted by a stunning view over the city towards the harbour.
Quebec is at the narrowest point of the St Lawrence and has been fought over by the English, French and Americans over the years as it controls access to the interior of Canada. The various fortifications are still in evidence and once again we were granted the services of an excellent guide who brought the history alive.
The feature of the next day was a voyage on the river to “whale watch” and we were lucky to see pods of both Beluga and Minke whales feeding in the St Lawrence at the point where the inflowing ocean meets the outflowing river. We saw several whales at times within yards of the ship but unlike cows they don’t hang about to be photographed. It was a beautiful day to be on the water and the Minke appeared just as we turning for home and caused a late departure which coupled with a time change on entering New Brunswick meant a midnight arrival at the hotel in Frederickton.
We were up early to travel to the 50 cow Cedar Ridge farm of Frank and Debbie Gordon and this was an impressive set up, having moved in recent years from the original holding a couple of miles away where 22 cows used to be housed into a new tie stall built by a cattle dealer for his export business and thus offering as good an environment as a tie stall can, and the cows have responded with an increase of over 2000 litres in the last two years, now averaging over 7000 litres. This is on big bale silage and concentrate as New Brunswick is too far north for Maize. The feature here was the youngstock with impressive heifers by Yogibear, Turley, Stone, Spider and a particularly nice calf by Adams Creek Regal Morey.
The outstanding cow in the shed here was Guernsey View Nikki by Roy and she had given over 8000 kgs in her last lactation, there were impressive cows in the shed by Ronald,Tiller, Bolero and Buttermost Warden and with all the cows in place with record cards in front of them as well as a brochure in hand it was a pleasure to visit. The Gordons had provided breakfast in the wood panelled lobby to the cow shed, an experience that is unlikely to occur very often, before we travelled back to the original farm to see some very impressive heifers none more so than Unity a Spider daughter of Nikki.
The second visit of the day was to the Wannamaker family where the Guernseys share a tie stall with Holsteins and enjoy a regular diet of brewers grains and hay, the popular choice here was a Tiller Lane cow followed by a Skipper. The Canadian team now bolstered by the arrival of Marie McNab, her son Colin and John Gordon, maintained their lead with Colin McNab scoring the maximum score.
We travelled to Moncton for the last three nights of the tour to find ourselves in the worst hotel of the trip, in an out of town situation with no restaurant and no bar! Apparently Moncton is hosting a Junior Athletic Competition and all the town centre and airport hotels are full.
The last visit of the tour was to the West Family at Dundas and this was an impressive set up with Father and two of the sons involved in managing a herd of about 80 Guernseys in free stalls and milked in a herringbone, the cows are on big bale silage with concentrates fed by out of parlour feeders. The family entertained us to a fabulous dinner in the farmhouse and the “judges” found 7 different cows to put top but cow 72 a Decision emerged as top placed with cow 1 a Roy in second place. I was apparently the only one to appreciate the strengths of 78 a Poker daughter and there were several good Poker daughters in the herd.
The youngstock here also impressed with daughters by Turley, Yogibear, Stone, the homebred Little Joe and Spring Walk Icy Cal catching the eye.
The visit to Prince Edward Island over the magnificent “billion dollar bridge” opened in the 1990’s and stretching for 12 miles was to a land of deep rich red soils more than half of which seems to be planted with potatoes and is the home of the McCain company. The capital of Charlottetown is an attractive town and boasts the “cows” ice cream company claimed to be the best in Canada. Clever merchandising with many famous shows such as “cows in the city” or “dancing with the steers” are bringing in plenty of money, but Brymor and Devonshire Farmhouse have nothing to fear.
A final dinner and the hard working Claude had persuaded the reluctant Holiday Inn to open a bar for the tourists to make there farewells, but with some leaving at 4am it was a subdued affair, but all are hoping to regather in 3 years time on Guernsey Island, lets hope the Federation do act upon the various initatives before then.