A group of about 50 Ontario Federation of Agriculture members (OFA) and Members of Provincial Parliament (MPP) toured Beverly Greenhouses in Dundas, Ont., as part of OFA’s annual Field Day. The English cucumber operation consists of 30 total acres, about 20 of which are in greenhouse production. And the VanderHout family, who own the farm, oversee every aspect of the cucumber’s development from seed to packaging.
The production techniques on the farm include integrated pest management (raising aphids to control other pests), burning wood as a heat source in the winter and recycling any water unused by the cucumber plant.
The operation is a perfect example of what agriculture in Ontario is today, according to OFA president Keith Currie. “From a state of the art facility to state of the art equipment, the farm is an exercise in agricultural production practices,” Currie told Farms.com. “It’s an assembly line with an agricultural focus.”
Click here for the complete article by Diego Flammini, including a video on the website of Farms.com