Dill

[nakodo]

Is anyone seeding any dill this year? There has been some grown around here S.W. Sask in the past and they have had good luck with it.

[cakadu]

Muttley, there are several in Saskatchewan that have small herds of milking goats and there was one outside of Saskatoon I think it was, that was doing not too bad. For information, as a start, I would try the goat breeders in Saskatchewan.

Most of the big goat dairies are down in Ontario and Quebec, with a couple in BC. Most in Alberta run home dairies, which means that they can sell up to 50L per day from the farm, once they get everything in place. Usually these home dairies do fairly well because the milk is processed the same day and it doesn't sit in the bulk tank for a couple of days or more waiting to get picked up and then dumped in with everything and then processed.

There was a goat milk processing facility here in Alberta - Ponoka actually - that closed up shop awhile ago. They made varioius goat cheeses and were looking at powdering the goats milk. It was run by one of Saputo's daughters and I've heard various reasons why it closed, but the long and short of it is that it did.

A couple of goat milk co-ops did exist here as well, but I have no idea as to what has happened with them. One of them folded because the processing facility went out of business and they were pretty closely tied to them.

Goat milk is popular with people who are lactose intolerant and for those who want something other than cows milk. It is naturally homogenized, which means that the fat globules are small enough that you don't get the cream rising to the top. It also has a few other health benefits to it as well.

I hope this is of some help.

[nakodo]

I would worry that dill is not so much a commodity until someone has a good year with it :-)

Seems you get one good year, double your acreage, have too much and sell the rest as seed.

Then all the neighbors plant it, glut the world market, drive the price below production.

No one grows it for a few years,

then someone grows it, makes a good profit and here we go again.

It was a good idea to hide your question in here instead of in the Special crops section .....

[rodbradshaw]

Dill is like the rest of the specialty hebs. 100 acres good profit and easy to sell, 1000 acres price dives below sea level. If you can get a production contract go for it but otherwise use extreme caution.

[melvill]

Some of my farmer clients in southern Alberta have had reasonably good experience growing dill on irrigated land. However, they have either owned or are located very close to an essential oil extraction facility that would extract the oil for them. There are two such facilities located near Bow Island, west of Medicine Hat. That community would be a place to start looking for further information. Call or e-mail me for further information.