A llama, 18 kilograms of dog food and a man’s vest are among the
donations for a fundraising event planned for Barthel, Sask., Sept. 21.
Herb grower Tomita Walker of Clive, Alta., got the idea to help out
after talking to her friend in Barthel. Evelyn Schnaider told Walker
the area had only six millimetres of rain from April to the end of
July. Although more has fallen now, farmers and ranchers are still in
trouble in northwestern Saskatchewan.
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Schnaider and her husband were baling their wheat for feed and bedding
in mid-August.
“Luckily we had downsized our herd a couple of years ago as we got
older.”
The Schnaiders have 60 cows, half of what they used to.
After hearing about the drought, Walker got on the phone to other
friends and whipped up an idea to raise money for the community through
a silent auction of donated articles.
She paired it with a business idea. Walker is organizing a conference
in the Barthel Community Hall on the same day with speakers from
Alberta Agriculture to talk about how to diversify by growing herbs and
other alternative crops. Money raised through the conference fees and
the auction will become seed money for farm women or families who wish
to start small home-based businesses.
“I think it’s exciting (that) a group from Alberta is helping
communities from Saskatchewan,” said Walker. “If every small community
could twin with another,” everybody would gain.
Schnaider started growing echinacea after she heard Walker speak in
1992. She has had varying success with her garden-sized plots but
thinks it would be a good project for a farm woman and her children
because it would not require a lot of room or money.
The payoff could be big, said Walker. A crop of the right variety of
echinacea – the shorter, less hardy augustofolia, which is harvested
for its roots in the second year – could be valuable. Walker said she
was contacted by an Italian buyer who wanted 30 tonnes of root.
“We’re lucky to get one tonne.”
For more information on the Sept. 21 conference and auction, contact
Walker at 403-784-2217.
