The two converted school buses and randomly “stored” cars and farm equipment on the property are just some of the things that point to the rich history of Gabriola’s Elgie Road Farm.
Farmer and owner Bobby Paul says the farm “seems to be a hub for every stray thing that comes to the island – livestock and people”. Take “Grimmer” the cat for example. Paul said Grimmer showed up at his door one day, and although he contacted “all the cat people” on the island, he was never able to find Grimmer’s original owners.
In the 1800’s Gabriolan farmer Tim Brown’s grandfather bought the three parcels of land which make up the 80 acre farm off North Road, Paul said. This included the 10 acre central parcel from the man after which both the farm and the road leading to it were named.
Paul said that the Browns sold the farm to the Pipers in the ‘30s. He said Mary Charles bought the farm sometime in the mid ‘60s, and that he started renting there in 1989. He said he also had some history on the farm “back in the hippy days … and it was always kind of a magical place to me”. He said in 2003-2004 he and a business partner bought two of the parcels that make up the farm.
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| Converted school buses are stored where the farmhouse once stood ~ Photo by Chris Bowers |
Pointing to the concrete slab on which the buses are stored, Paul said the original farm house had been there. He said: “There was no power and a whole bunch of hippies living here and Mary finally sprung to get power here in summer of ‘85. They finally got electricity here after all these years of no power, and the first thing they did was put in a little grow-op and burned the house down”.
Paul said that in the early ‘70s the Charles family hired someone to put in a hayfield and when he came in to cut the hay the next year “there was a group of sun worshippers here”, who had dug some trenches in the field to mimic Stonehenge. Pointing out a couple of small buildings built by past renters, he noted there was “quite a group of people” living on the farm when he first found his way there in ‘76.
Paul said “a guy named Keeble” also built a shed in the bush in front of the farm in which he was building “an ark”, in preparation for the end of the world. However Keeble was deported back to England, and the ark slowly disintegrated, Paul said.
The carrot patch Paul has cleared is surrounded by roots and branches which, he said, both keep out the deer, and will eventually be converted into berms. He said despite making “a lot of mistakes” with his first crop, he grew 10,000 pounds of carrots last year, using only half the field.
Paul said he sold about 2,500 pounds of carrots to Village Foods, and the rest was sold to Island Naturals in Nanaimo, wholesaled to private customers, and sold at various farmers’ markets. He said he is aiming to grow 40,000 pounds of carrots this summer, and that he will have no problem selling everything he can grow.
Although his operation is not certified organic, Paul said, he meets or exceeds all the necessary standards, with the exception of the seeds he uses. He said he prefers a sweet, quick growing carrot that over-winters well, and that he purchases his seeds at West Coast Seeds –an independent seed supplier.
For the last four or five years Paul has also been working on installing a one acre pond. He thinks it will be ready to stock with trout this year, and is hoping to develop enough stock so he can sell it commercially. He said that the hoops that need jumping in order to sell to grocery stores and restaurants are off-putting but that “there’s good money, apparently, in just letting people come and fish”.
Paul also has plans to put in fruit trees and hazelnuts on the farm.
Paul said that he has had about 20 years of planning what he will do with the farm, but that now that he is actually doing the work, he is realising that “it’s going to take about 10 of me to do it, so I’m kind of looking at a cooperative option – just because financially I can’t afford to stay home and farm, because it doesn’t pay the bills”.
Paul said he could continue specialising in his carrots, and people could put different crops into other gardens. The crops could be rotated through the acreage, he said, with each co-op member responsible for their own crops. He said that he needed people who recognised that although the work is not heavy, the hours are long, and there is always the risk that “some new bug will show up and you’ll lose everything”.
Paul also noted that organisation was not his forte, and it would be helpful to find someone who is able to organise the work.
