Adam Prudhomme
Editor
Operating a sheep farm on a rock in the middle of Lake Ontario, staff at Amherst Island’s Topsy Farms know a thing or two about how to adapt.
Tourism Industry Association of Ontario recently recognized the family-run farm for its resourcefulness, awarding them three Resiliency Awards. Their wins were in the categories of Attractions and Conventions, Conference and Event Planner and a collaboration award for the #GrowStronger community garden program with Kubota Canada.
The Resiliency Awards were born as part of a mission to honour tourism businesses that met the challenges of 2020 with innovation and found ways to survive even if they couldn’t welcome visitors.
“What a great title for how this team here on the farm has been performing,” said Jacob Murray, who along with farming, serves as director of media and marketing for Topsy. “I could not be more proud of the staff and the volunteers and everyone who has been involved with this farm.”
In a perfect example of fortune favouring the prepared, Topsy Farms was already undergoing a shift from strictly agriculture to including a tourism component before the world was turned upside down. It was that foresight that helped earn them two of the their three Resiliency Awards.
“In 2018 we started a program that we called Connect to the Land,” recalled Murray. “At its fundamental basics is in order to save this farm we have to share the farm. That looks like opening up our walking trails in the forest. So we’ve gone through a lot of effort to make that public access. People can come and bring a picnic and sit on the beach around the farmyard. We have a kids area, we have a scavenger hunt that people can ask for, there’s no cost. Connect to the land, we take our retail sales and we fund free events and the projects that we have going on both educational and entertainment.”
In early 2020 the farm brought in an events coordinator with the intent of expanding on some of their popular attractions such as sheep shearing and lambing. And then COVID-19 forced them to re-work those plans on the fly. Already known for their wool and sheepskin products, they’re reimagined the business to include workshops and events.
Practicing downward facing dog yoga among the sheep. Submitted photo.
“We asked the question at a time when people can’t show up to Topsy, how can Topsy show up to them,” said Murray. “So everyday we put out blogs and videos and stories and poems and pictures. We did Zoom tours for schools, we did live interactive videos of those events. When we were shearing the sheep instead of people coming to the barn, we brought the cameras into the barn and used up all our data but we got the videos out.”
As a second-generation farmer, Murray says he and his family are used to the unexpected challenges that come with agriculture-even if no one could have ever predicted a worldwide pandemic.
“I do think that farms and farmers are uniquely positioned to lead out of this pandemic and the trauma of it because we are simply accustomed to being at the whim of forces beyond our control,” he said. “Weather is the obvious one but health if you have animals or bugs if you have crops. Adapting to change is a thing that farmers are really good at. With Topsy we are in the middle of a transition from the first founders of the farm now into the new generation. This is all happening all at the same time.”
When the anxiety of the pandemic got to be too much, Murray says the family decided to put that energy to good use.
“We decided to plant gardens for our neighbours,” said Murray, explaining the birth of the project that would be known as #GrowStronger. “We have lumber, we have stones, we have manure, we have top soil. The only thing we didn’t have was the equipment to be able to easily transport that stuff up and down the roads. That’s when Kubota the tractor company heard about our plans. They offered the use of their equipment in order to facilitate that. Our plan started out like maybe we’ll do two or three gardens and that’ll be great. They sent us tractors and a skid steer loaders and a dump trailer and a full loader tractor. It was incredible. Watching that equipment come off the ferry and roll up to the farm, it felt like we were in a dream.”
The end result was 20 gardens planted in 30 days. Though it was a grueling physical endeavor, Murray says it paid off in several ways beyond simply providing food for those in need.
“The most gratifying thing of all was the message that we would get from a random person on a Tuesday saying I never planted a garden before, I live in the city and I just see my lettuce poking up,” said Murray. “Or in the country side I’ve been inspired to double the size of the space that I already have.”
Looking ahead to next year, the family is planning a yearlong celebration to mark its 50th year and to continue to welcome guests of all ages to visit the land and to get inspired by nature.
For more on the farm and their upcoming events, visit www.TopsyFarms.com.