How prevalent is this?

[Eastcoaster]

Eastcoaster, it depends on what area in AB. one talks about whether farmers are working off farm or are still full time farming.
In the resource based communities such as the one where I live many farmers have small businesses or work in the petroleum industry or the local Weyerhauser Mill and run small cow/calf operations, or larger cow/calf operations if they have a good wife that can feed and calve cows, or a son still at home etc.
In many areas of AB. farming is full time, in the Peace Country there are huge grain and grass seed operations, and in the south there are many large operations that are either grain or livestock or both that require a full time committment. In other areas of the province there are still many full time farmers, but as you indicated it is certainly not an industry that is attracting many young people nor are many young folks that grew up on the farm staying on the farm .

[cowman]

Horse: Armitage Brothers never went broke. They sold off most of their land and feedlot to a purbred outfit. This is some of the land they kept. The younger generation didn't want to continue with farming and at least one of them has gone into road construction. I would assume he will be doing a lot of the construction on this project.
The feedlot is empty except for the purebred cattle.

[cowman]

One other thing. This land where this "hamlet" is going in is very productive farmland. Now instead of grain,hay and cattle growing there we will have houses,dogs and kids! When all the good land is gone, where are we going to grow the food?

[sagewood]

Well all you folks are right--however, until this country values food as much as it does oil and gas, the beat will go on. People will pay big bucks for oil and gas, but ask for an increase to make ag. food a little more profitable and they scream bloody murder and site all the cases of government helping out farmers/ranchers etc. etc. Instead of calling all of these idiot government programs as 'ag. assistance', how about let's call them what they are--support for a fair price for a product that people cannot do without--I darn sure can heat my home another way if need be, and I can still ride a horse and/or walk for transportation, but by golly, I simply cannot get by without food---quality food and lots of it year round is the first need of mankind--somehow, mansions, 'toys', vehicles worth $200,000 etc. have all passed by food.

So in answer to you question about where our food will come from when all the ag. land is paved over and all the young people have moved to the city for jobs etc...we will pay some other country for importing all of our food--then watch the price increase, the quality decrease and the line ups for food will be evident across Canada--ever see news reels of Europeans lining up for food? They are not about to let their ag. industry go under--lots of them still remember what it is like to be hungry for years and what they got to eat was molded and rotten....history will repeat itself, however, it will repeat itself in Canada and not in Europe...yes, I have to have some off-farm income to keep going, but you know--I do what I can to keep the bills current, but am sticking with my hay and my cows--my first and last love as a way to make a living and enjoy my work...

[countryguy]

Excellent post Sagewood!!

[grassfarmer]

Agree with your sentiments Sagewood but the European analogy isn't quite right in my experience - certainly not in Britain although it may still exist in France and to a lesser extent Italy. Survivors of the two world wars certainly did remember the lessons of the wartime hunger and reliance on overseas food. Unfortunately the current generation of political leaders are born post war and the lessons have been lost on them - Blair in Britain is 100% happy to have zero agriculture and import everything which shapes his Ag. policy.
With the issue of importing or transporting food across the world we really should be getting smarter - it's not only a case of what happens if supply is interrupted but also a case of how much it costs to stock Canadian shelves with Brazilian / Australian etc produce. Unfortunately the politicians can only think one dimensionally and can't see beyond the $ and cents of the product on the shelf to the real financial, human, environmental and ethical cost of landing that product here.

[sagewood]

Yes, of course I am showing my age, and those I hang out with by remembering the war and the shortages of food in Europe and here in Canada and the rationing that went on even after the war...however, your point of the interruption of the transfer of food was well taken--and was mostly my point--when you cannot feed yourself, all the outside factors, such as transportation can hold you hostage. I guess they have not paved over Saskatchewan yet, and are unlikely to do so if we pave the land that supports ag. in Alberta, then we can all move to Sask. Having originally migrated from there as a child, I can attest to the fact that they have wonderful, heavy 'gumbo' soil, that on a good year will produce till the bins burst and the grazing lands are vast.

[cowman]

Actually we just keep producing more food everyday on less and less land?
It does bother me however that much of the really good land is going under pavement? Take a drive east or south of Red Deer and watch them strip 3 to 4 feet of black loam off the fields! It is really a nuisance to find a place to stockpile it. The high berm around the Red Deer dump(480 acres) is totally black loam!
Meanwhile on the poor land further east you can't grow much other than scrubby grass and brush...just no top soil and too much sand and gravel. Whenever it comes to city growth and saving the farm land you can bet the city will always win? That is why I kind of laugh when someone says it is important to save farm land...it just isn't going to happen.

[cowman]

I am faced with having to oppose an application that is coming from a neighbour whose intention is to take three parcels out of a quarter adjacent to me.
There are two feedlots within a mile of the property and putting multi-lot subdivisions and feedlots in the same area just does not work.
The municipal planning commission needs to decide whether or not they want to leave areas where agriculture can still operate without conflicts in the community.

My neighbour just sold their cowherd and have now decided they can sell off the home quarter with three subdivisions out and have enough to build a house across the road on another quarter....and live happily ever after.

Their rationale for applying for these parcels out is that nobody can make a living farming !!!!!

If one of the feedlot operators files a part one of an application for a backgrounding lot to the NRCB before the subdivision application comes in, it won't get to first base but neither of the feelot owners want to start a range war, but they are fully aware that any subdivisions approved in this area will stop any future expansion of either of their operations.
This isn't land located adjacent to a town, village or hamlet. It is 11 miles from the nearest town out in an area where there are many large livestock operations.

Where I live there are three small parcels of land within half a mile. Where it used to be peaceful most of the time there are now 8 teenagers with quads, 6 dogs and lord knows how many kids with vehicles....sometimes in the spring, summer and fall quads tear up and down the road until 3:00 AM. If I wanted to start a trucking company on my property I would be restricted to hours of operation, and most likely would not be allowed to have trucks driving in and out after midnight so as not to disturb the neighbours !!!

Saving farm land is important but more important is not creating conflicting landuses.

[cakadu]

A couple of points.... We are producing more and more of what we are having a harder and harder time selling for a decent price, let alone a good price that puts money into producers pockets.

Grassfarmer (glad to see you back posting by the way) brings up a good point about getting the food from point A to point B. I know I've said this before, but it bears repeating again and again... There are only 5 major distributors in the world. Think of the ramifications of them having total control of who gets what to eat and how much, what brands etc. If people are upset with the Monsantos of the world for the perceived control they have over the production side, then how upset are they going to be when they are at the mercy of the distributors?

I agree with emrald in terms of preserving good land coupled with the need to ensure that landuses conflict as little as possible. Acreage owners get upset by combines going late into the night, manure spreading and weaning time because that isn't what they came to the country for. The flip side of that is farmers having to deal with the types of things that emrald speaks of...kids on all kinds of mechanical gizmos riding around at all times of the day or night, sometimes disturbing livestock because of where and how they are driving etc. What recourse do we have for this? People come from the city not understanding how things work out in the country and yet they expect to be able to do things because they own an acre or two. They couldn't roar up and down city streets on quads, dirt bikes etc. so why should country roads be any different?

[cakadu]

The posts by Sagewood, Purecountry et al are great because we need to look at the social costs of all of this money flowing. Abuse, addiction problems, medical problems, psychological problems and more are on the increase, yet we don't want to spend anything more on social problems. In fact, many want to see social programs cut. We have some of the highest divorce, addiction and abuse problems going on in this land of plenty. Is that the kind of legacy we wish to leave? We have a generation that is feeling that it is entitled to everything and it deserves everything. Whatever happened to working and feeling good about what you are doing - no matter what the job is. Someone posted that we need all of these jobs to make things tick and that is very true. Someone who collects the mountains of waste we produce every week is no less valuable than the natural resource worker who is raking in big money.

The bust is going to be far more severe this time around, whenever it occurs. Credit is far more readily available, costs are pushed way beyond what is reasonable and the list goes on.

There are consequences to this boom that we don't even know about yet. How are we going to be prepared for those?

[cowman]

Linda: Its called riding the wave? You either go for the ride or you don't...either way you pay the price at the end?
I sincerely doubt we are going to move back into some "shangri la"...whatever that is...maybe the fifties?
Times change, and "stuff" happens? LOL
You deal with it? That is life?
Kids riding quads on the roads? Phone your county mountie or the real thing? Isn't that what they are being paid for?
I have thought quite a bit about this subject Of how society is changing? After all I was a kid in the sixties? Would I want to go back to those days and those simpler times? Nope I definitely wouldn't! Life is so much better in this day and age...you can't even compare it.