MORTLACH, Sask. – The Adams family thought long and hard and made the decision to go farming – twice.
The first time was in 1981 just before high interest rates, drought and grain subsidy wars made prairie farming undesirable. The second time was 1993 after they sold their three quarter sections of land in the Kelvington area to an Indian band as part of a treaty land entitlement.
“We considered not farming,” said Gloria Adams. But her job as a laboratory technician was at risk with the province slashing health-care budgets, so she and Cyril decided he should upgrade his jack-of-all-trades skills while they decided what to do. The first choice for them and their five children was to farm. But affordable land was tough to find.
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“We took out a map. Alberta was too expensive,” said Gloria.
“We wanted to be near a major centre,” said Cyril.
Eventually they found what they wanted through an ad in The Western Producer – a large 1917 farmhouse on five quarters near Moose Jaw, Sask. Over the winter of 1994, Cyril made 17 trips to move the farm and household.
“It was 203 miles from door to door,” he said. “That spring there were floods cutting the roads. I dropped the last load at 10 p.m. May 15, with the farm machinery disassembled, and began seeding May 16.”
Cyril grins at the memory of that year and takes out a cigarette.
“We seeded everything. It was kind of a learning process because the land was so different.”
Gloria and the children moved two months later from the wooded area in the province’s northeast after school was done. That first summer they camped, she said, as a new foundation was put under the old house. They appreciated the house for its three-metre-high ceilings, spacious rooms and dark-stained fir woodwork.
The well water is good on their new farm and a nearby Ducks Unlimited project on Pelican Lake ensures privacy, shelters wildlife and enriches the view of the flat, dry land that is now their home.
They grow wheat, durum, canola, flax and hay and plan on trying fall rye this year. But both hold down full-time jobs in nearby Moose Jaw, Gloria at the hospital and Cyril for the John Deere dealer. It is a necessity, they say. Some day they may try cattle to replace one of their jobs since they have lots of hay land.
Their farm work is done on weekends and evenings.
“Cyril would get the machinery working and I’d seed,” said Gloria.
Their oldest boy, 15, did the swathing. Luckily their land is all in one block. The alfalfa helps spread the work through the summer and they always buy used machinery and renovate it. They also use a cell phone to stay in touch with each other.
The Adams hold strong views. They say if urban consumers would pay more for food, farmers would not have to take city jobs to keep going. People are scared of losing what they’ve got so they hang onto any sort of job.
“People can handle it if they’re committed to it, otherwise you’ll burn out,” said Gloria. “We could have a nice life with our two jobs. Now on our holidays we go to another job.”
But moaning and groaning about the situation won’t help, said Gloria: “It’s been hard but it’s the only way we’ve seen to survive. Farming hasn’t treated us kindly.”
Cyril added they’ve been frozen out, hailed out and rained out. Then simultaneously he and Gloria add, “and bought out.”
Gloria bristles when she says the federal government’s farm policy is spotty.
“We don’t need a bunch more meetings, then things get shelved.”
She complained about what she sees as the federal government’s inconsistency in helping out failing urban-based companies, yet failing to come up with help for farmers.
They also wonder why Canada has cut its farm support while the United States continues its subsidies.
Cyril said if American farmers want to bring a truckload north that’s fine with him. It would not take long before they realize they get a better deal south of the border.
Gloria grows angry when she thinks about the recent Canadian Wheat Board election. Because they have one permit book she and Cyril had to share one vote even though they are a legal farming partnership, as well as a marital one. She wrote letters to The Producer and the federal government about it. It reminds her of the fight she had in 1982 to get listed on the permit book as a partner, not just a wife.
The cost of chemicals is another issue. They don’t think it is feasible to go organic, but acknowledge that urban concerns will drive all farmers to be more environmentally conscious.
“I won’t spray,” said Gloria. “I don’t want to make a mistake and sterilize the ground.”
While Cyril sprays, it is seldom corner to corner.
“I spot-spray. I look out back at that ‘v’ of liquid. That’s just dollar signs coming out.”
Cyril and Gloria don’t belong to farm groups. Gloria said they are apolitical, then said maybe it is that she is too opinionated. They also think farmer loyalty is a thing of the past. In Kelvington they hauled to Saskatchewan Wheat Pool but now they take grain samples to different elevators before choosing a delivery point.
“This is a business,” said Cyril. “If someone is going to give me $2 a bushel and someone $2.50, then guess who wins?”
