A chilly autumn breeze served as a reminder of the approaching winter frost as Durham College hosted its Fall Farm Open House in Ajax on Oct. 8, offering the community one last chance to connect with local produce before the snow starts to fall.
The Barrett Centre of Innovation in Sustainable Urban Agriculture, which sits on Harwood Avenue North, opened in 2023 with a commitment to teaching community members about the role of local farms and produce.
As part of their hands-on learning, Durham College horticulture and agriculture students grow vegetables like beets, broccoli and carrots, herbs like sage and thyme, as well collect honey from bees at the centre, all of which is available for purchase on Thursdays throughout the harvest season.
Durham College grad Tamara Green led a vegetable tempura demo at the entrance of the farm to show visitors an easy recipe to try at home with their newly purchased produce. Deeper into the farm, there was also a table set up with honey from the centre’s own beehive, teaching visitors about different kinds of honey and bee cycles.
Carey Yeoman, Strategic Initiatives manager, said the centre is a place to “connect people back to why we need farms and farmers.”
She said for generations, many families had a grandparent or other relative involved in agriculture, but in recent years that trend has decreased, leaving people without knowledge about where their food comes from.
“We’re really focused on trying to make a farm space as accessible as possible, so people can understand the value that farms have in their community,” said Yeoman. “Farming is not a noisy, smelly, dirty business. It can be all of those things, but it doesn’t have to be. All kinds of farming are different.”
Yeoman’s observations echo a broader provincial trend. According to the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, as of 2022, Ontario loses 319 acres of farmland every day, which is equivalent to losing roughly nine family farms each week.
Farm manager, Craig Kelman, advocates for the idea that anyone can improve knowledge about growing food and being sustainable, regardless of their skillset or background.
Last year, he said, he had a welder, a crane operator and a millwright helping him run the farm because they all shared a passion for agriculture, which started in their youth.
That community connection extended to two neighbouring high schools, J. Clarke Richardson Collegiate and Notre Dame Catholic Secondary School, which share a parking lot with the centre.
“[Students] often come over on their lunch break on Thursdays, study at the picnic table, and they interact with our staff. They ask amazing questions,” said Yeoman. “Taking that little leap of faith and changing hearts and minds about what it is to be a teenager has been a really unexpected benefit.”
Community member, Joanne Wright, said she comes to the Barrett Centre every Thursday to see what new recipes she can try with fresh produce.
“I’ve been finding over the years that when I’m buying produce in the grocery store, things just don’t seem to be tasting the same. I start to second guess that maybe it’s my taste buds,” said Wright. “But then you realize, no, it’s not.”
Members of the Durham Master Gardeners, including Anne Kern, Cori Whittington, and Auryn Braini, were also on hand to offer advice to prospective growers who may not know where to start.
“The first question is, what do you like to eat? If you don’t like zucchini, don’t grow it because you’ll have a lot,” said Kern. “It’s about identifying what you’d like and then starting with what your soil is like.”
Whittington added many young families from all over the world are eager to learn about growing their own food and sharing that knowledge with their children and grandchildren. She said children love picking local strawberries because they taste “like sunshine.”
As its lease comes to an end next September, the Barrett Centre will relocate to Durham College’s Whitby campus. Though leaving Ajax will be bittersweet, Yeoman looks forward to creating similar opportunities.
“I love the idea of students on the way to class seeing some of our work-integrated learning students pruning the raspberry canes and offering them a couple raspberries on their morning walk,” Yeoman said.
To mark the end of their time in Ajax, Kelman promises a proper community farewell.
“Maybe in the first week of August next year, we’ll have a big corn roast,” Kelman said. “We’ll invite all the community, bring everybody back and just have a big party to end it all.”