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Poor Ruedi. Our choir is tuning our concert repretoire at a retreat in a beautiful Black Forest resort. While the rest of us butter nutty whole wheat croissants and top slices of braided loaves with our Black Forest ham, Ruedi makes due with heavy pieces of gluten free bread.

Three years ago Ruedi learned that he had celiac disease. The disease is an abnormal immune system reaction to gluten protein found in wheat, barley and rye (and for some, also in oats). The reaction reduces or stops the absorption of food in the small intestine, resulting in malnutrition. There is only one cure – stop eating anything containing gluten protein. Logically that includes breads, pastas, cereals and other bread products. But gluten is used in many places we don’t think of – in spices, additives and sauces. Ice Cream and even chocolate have to be carefully screened. It’s a tough diet change!

Ruedi is upset with the Swiss agriculture department, which plans to set up a new pricing system for wheat, adding increased pay for higher protein content. We already have that in Canada, where the base price for wheat starts at 11.5% protein. Higher protein wheat receives higher prices. Traditionally Swiss wheat varieties have been low protein. Schaffhausen seed growers have just started some trials with two varieties of Hard Wheat, with higher protein traits. This isn’t good news for Ruedi, who believes that the new high protein varieties are causing the increased rates of celiac disease.

Although increased celiac cases have as much to do with better assessment and knowledge of symptoms, Ruedi might not be so wrong. Check http://www.doctorauer.com/biochemistry-nutrition/understanding-gluten-the-effects-of-grain-based-diets-part-ii-the-nitty-gritty-on-gluten/ for one story. Our North American and European diets include much more high protein wheat products than they used to. We eat more bread made from higher protein wheat (because the farmer produces what the industry wants), more pasta and packaged cereals. So much of whatever else we buy contains gluten protein too. For those who are at all gluten intolerant (which is a genetic trait) it is a dangerous world out there.

But Ruedi would be happy to know that research is also working for him. Professor Diter von Wettstein at Washington State University is labouring with an international crew to breed a variety of wheat that is celiac friendly. Wheat contains over 150 different proteins. Only six are needed for good baking quality. The group is trying to eliminate as many proteins as possible in the hope that celiac sufferers will one day be able to eat bread like everyone else.

http://www.edmondsun.com/opinion/x611944287/Wheat-research-Improving-on-the-staff-of-life
http://www.foodsafetynews.com/2010/01/genetically-modified-foods-are-becoming-1/

It’s highly likely that at least some farmers will be vying to grow a low protein wheat in the future again.

Every farmer knows a tractor burns fuel when used and makes sure to check the gauge every so often. No one wants to be left stranded at the side of the road or field. But if we don’t check, there’s always the warning light to remind us we’re running low. We know how to look after our tractors. Do we know how to look after ourselves?

Burnout was the theme of a workshop I attended at the Strickhof Agriculture College in Wülflingen, Switzerland. It’s a common word in the working world. Swiss farmers aren’t exempt, and I don’t think Canadian farmers are either. The idyllic picture many urbanites have of the farm – a slower lifestyle, riding the range with the dog trotting alongside – is far from reality for most farmers all over the world. Increasing pressure from tight margins, heavier regulations, more paperwork, less personnel for more acres are taking their toll. One or both partners work off the farm. Relationships are more complex. Sometimes it all becomes too much. Even the smallest task feels too hard, we’re so tired we can hardly move, there’s no point to living anymore. Call it depression or burnout.

Why do we fill the tractor when it’s time but don’t heed the warning signs of our own bodies? We’ve been tired for a long time, we’re always irritated and uptight, we smoke or drink more, we lose interest in our work, our relationships, sex. It’s time to tank up! But we don’t – we don’t know how, or we don’t have time, or we’re ashamed to admit we need help. We don’t want to look like a wimp.

It takes a long time to recuperate from a real burnout. Two weeks at the Mexican Riviera isn’t going to do the trick. It can take years and often we never quite regain what was lost. A counsellor once told me it’s comparable to running a motor in the red. If you wait too long, the motor is never the same again.

It’s important to take breaks. Annual holidays are good, but better are daily little time-outs. “It’s better to take a mini holiday every day, than to long for the big ones,” Dr. Marianne Breu told us at the workshop. Take time for a cup of coffee out in the garden or an after lunch nap – especially during calving season! Go for a walk through the bush when the leaves are coming out. Do deep breathing and/or yoga and meditation exercises; draw, run, or do whatever relaxes you.

And please, go for help! Admitting he has depression is probably about as hard for a farmer as it is for an African to admit they have AIDS. Often both would rather die. At the workshop, Dr. Peter Strate said that people usually wait 10-15 years before they go for help, and by then they’ve often lost their job or families. Don’t wait that long – for your own sake and the sake of your families.

Watch that personal fuel gauge. Are you running low? If you’re not sure, ask your family. They might be quite happy to tell you! Don’t wait until you’re stranded at the side of the road, alone.

As kids, if we were angry with each other, we’d yell, “You’re a dumb cow!” We had it wrong. Cows aren’t dumb. If anything, their owners might be, because they don’t understand what their cows are saying to them. Communication between humans supposedly consists of 97 percent body language. Between cows and humans it’s more like 99 percent. Paying attention to it will increase a cow’s comfort and the owner’s pocket book.

Cowsignals originated in Holland, with Jan Hulsen and is taught in over 30 countries. I joined a course in Schaffhausen with instructor Christian Manser, who has taught in Canada too. Cows give clear signals about their well being. Careful observance helps prevent diseases and other issues before they become a problem. Most cattle owners already monitor their cows closely, especially during calving season. But this goes more in depth.

Christian had us standing out in Bernard Mueller’s feed den for awhile, looking around the barn for problem spots. Is there mold somewhere? Wet spots, danger spots – spots where cattle slip, narrow passage ways, rods poking out at odd places? Is there enough air movement everywhere?

Watch the cows. Why do they prefer that side? Go down there, smell. Maybe the air is cleaner, cooler. Maybe there’s a bully on the other side.

It’s been awhile since I last had cows licking my rubber boots, but that’s how close we had to get to them next. Check them out. Are there sore spots? Are the spots often in the same place or height in different cows? The cows are probably rubbing against something somewhere. If it hurts when they have to go somewhere, they won’t want to go there. That’s not good news if it’s the mineral lick or the water tank. “Cows never lie,” Christian told us. Bernard made new box stalls, thinking they were an improvement over the old ones. But the cows tried to lay in the old ones if possible. “Roll up your jeans, kneel down there,” Christian said. The new matting was rough, uncomfortable; not as soft as the straw bedding in the old.

“You’ve got to think like a cow,” Christian kept saying. Walk through the milk parlour or around the barn as if you were a cow. Are there slippery spots? Are some areas too bright or too dark? Can their eyes adjust quickly enough?

Well, I am not a cow, even if my sisters did sometimes call me one. But I sure did gain a lot of respect for their behaviour that I never thought about before. So did the other participants. “We’ll walk into the barn with new eyes tonight,” they said. I’m sure their cows will appreciate that.

“Cow Signals” by Jan Hulsen can be obtained at various online booksellers, including http://www.amazon.co.uk

Pastel primula cover whole lawns, violets push through the dead grass, and the winter cereals are a lush green. Spring is in the Swiss air, and so is liquid manure and Decis. The beginning of the growing season is a good time to spread liquid manure on winter crops. So much for that fresh air driving through the spring countryside! It’s also a good growing season for all kinds of bugs. Hence the Decis. When hiking in Switzerland right now, stay upwind of a sprayer. Insecticides are not a good thing to inhale.

Despite the coldest winter in over 20 years, the winter crops are all thriving. There was some concern when the coldest days went down to minus 20 degrees Celsius, but there was enough snow cover. It’s been close to plus 20 degrees Celsius lately. The canola will probably bloom in a couple weeks – about then when western Canadian farmers will be getting their seed drills ready. The sugar beets were seeded just before the rain a week ago; the moisture just enough to germinate that which was in the dry. A rain would be timely about now.

There’s a hay field between our house and the street, about the size of four building lots. Every available arable piece is utilized here. The guy renting it just fertilized it – it probably took him all of fifteen minutes. I hardly had time to get my camera out. A good amount of fertilizer granules landed on our lawn. He’s lucky I’m not as picky as some house owners around. I once watched a woman laboriously pick out each granule that landed in her garden, because she passionately believes in living organic.

It’s not always easy for farmers to cultivate fields and meadows tucked in so closely among the village. People are highly sensitized to overuse of chemicals and manure, and there are always those who don’t hesitate to make phone calls if they feel farmers have been on the road with the sprayer once too often. It really does take a certain amount of cooperation between residents and farmers of a rural village like Schleitheim, where most days see tractors hurtling down Main Street at 40 kilometres per hour, and farmers spray insecticide on canola next to apartment blocks. But as long as everyone is reasonable, things seem to work.

I think part of the reason the Swiss take such an interest in how their food is produced could be that farmers and non-farmers live in such close proximity to each other. The farmer’s fields are the urbanite’s playground. They hike and bike along the fields and meadows. Not much can be kept secret. This frustrates some farmers, who feel they are under constant watch. Others use the opportunities the situation provides for roadside produce stands, cut-flower fields, or signs that showcase what farmers are doing for the environment.

Tuscany holiday highlights are supposed to be admiring Michelangelo’s statue of David in the Galleria dell ‘Accademia in Florence, or visiting the many duomos (domes) of cities like Siena with their frescos and marble carvings. We didn’t see David – that’s for next time. We did visit Siena’s Duoma, which is so spectacular it would take at least a day to really take it all in. But one of the highlights of our trip to the Toscana was the visit to Beatrice Massaza’s olive press and farm.

Beatrice, like Serena from our resort, took over the 13 hectare olive farm from her father. She also runs an agritourismo business, providing rooms or small apartments for up to 20 people with meals in the century old farmhouse. But her passion is producing a top quality olive oil. That passion has paid off in the prestigious Italian first prize for organic extra virgin olive oil. Her son Amedeo told us that. His mother doesn’t really care much about winning, he says.

The oil from Podere SS. Annunziata II is better than hers, Serena says. Part of that is size – they can pick faster and press fresher than she can. But it’s more, Serena thinks – Beatrice invests much more time and effort in the care of her trees.

Waving her arm at the olive groves in the valley around us, Beatrice says, “These trees are for my children and grandchildren.” She’s working for their future. The olive press and the windmill to pump water for irrigating the trees are for now, for her.

Serena says, “But maybe our children won’t care about the farm when they’re grown.” It seems at least one of Beatrice’s children, her son Amedeo, does care. In excellent English (he’s studying human rights at the University of Pisa) he tells us of staying up nights to communicate with the FDA personnel in the USA. He wants to export his mother’s oil, and that of other farmers whose olives she presses, directly into the US market.

The olive press building, powered by the solar panels tiling the roof, reminds me of a winery with its shiny chrome vats and press. The words Beatrice uses are similar to that of wine – they produce a Grand Cru with the fruity flavour of artichokes. But there is no fermented smell of grapes, just of lightly spicy oil. During the olive harvest, which lasts from October to November, Beatrice spends 20 hours a day here, personally watching over the pressing process to make sure each bottle of oil is the very best.

SS. Annunziata produces an average of 2000 bottles of their own oil a year, with Beatrice’s trees averaging 40 kilograms of olives per tree. Recently Beatrice has begun producing soap from her Extra Virgin Olive Oil.

We go home with the gift of a bottle of prize winning oil, a bar of the special soap and the inspiration a passionate farmer always is for another farmer. That she is a woman is even more inspiration to me…

We’re back ‘home’ in Switzerland, far from the Tuscan sun and ocean and olive groves. We never did get to visit with the bigger farmer. Instead we got a lesson in organic olive farming from Serena di Malfatto and husband Fabrizio, our hosts at Costa Etrusca, the Agritourismo farm we stayed at.

In 1993 Serena took over her father’s six hectares of land close to the Mediterranean coast. She uprooted the grapevines and replaced them with olive trees, which are less labour intensive. Pruning of the trees, which is just finishing, and harvesting the olives are the big jobs. Harvesting is done by hand. A tarp is spread under the tree, and the fruit is pulled off the fine branches with combs. Fabrizio harvests most of their 1200 trees with their hired hand.

Many farmers put tarps under the trees well before harvest, to catch whatever olives fall prematurely. This is what lower quality, cheaper olive oil is made of, as many of the olives are bruised or already fermenting by the time they are pressed. Serena says the best oil is made when the olives are still partly green, before they are fully mature. The sooner the olives are pressed after picking, the better the oil.

Serena brings her olives to her neighbours to press. When they come home with the oil, it’s a party. Everyone joins together for fresh oil and bread, the way good olive oil should be enjoyed. It`s never better than that first day.

The decision to grow olives organically was a life style choice. “I don’t want to grow poison,” Serena says. Since making the switch from conventional to organic, the harvests are smaller. Serena says the trees still produce the same, but the olive fly causes many olives to fall prematurely. There is a biological spray that is allowed for organic farms, but Fabrizio feels it’s not very effective. Some use insect traps, which are quite expensive.

Growing organically didn`t increase the price of the oil. Fabrizio says it’s ironic that people have no problem paying 15 to 20 Euros for a good bottle of wine, but they think that 10 Euros for a litre of good olive oil is too much. (One Euro is equal to approximately Can$1.40.)

A healthy mature tree produces about 25 kilograms of Olives, which makes about four litres of oil. Many trees are still young. Last year was dry, so the harvest was much smaller.

The Agriturismo business – the resort – is Serena’s main stream of income. In the busy season they cater to 50-60 patrons per day. I’m not surprised – it’s a beautiful location, the food is great, the rooms comfortable, and Serena and Fabrizio are very gracious hosts. (http://www.agriturismocostaetrusca.it/eng/)

Serena didn’t put me to the taste test between better and poorer quality oil, as she said she would. Instead Fabrizio poured dark red wine into goblets – from Suvereto, the best there is, he claims. Serena drizzled their very own organic extra virgin olive oil over toasted fresh baguette slices on a wooden plate. Life can be that simple, that good.

“We’re both farmers,” I tell Serena, as we check in at the Agriturismo Costa Etrusca in the Tuscany. We’re spending the week at their resort and small farm near San Vincento, on the Tuscany coast.

“And you come to stay at a farm!” she exclaims. Of course. Farmers like nothing better than to visit other farmers. “I just have a little farm,” Serena says. It’s an olive farm, as so many of the farms around here. Flanked by low mountains with stone quarries, olive groves cover the gentle hills that stop just short of the Mediterranean Sea. Sitting on the patio before our apartment, we can see the ocean including Elba Island. Beautiful!

Serena is going to buy an ordinary bottle of Extra Virgin Olive Oil, and let us compare its taste with their own olive oil. I’ll let you know what the difference is. Last week, Grandpa Robert and I took our three month old grandsons to the farmer’s market in Baden, Switzerland and met Mr. Lehmann, a Swiss who spends his summers growing olives in the Tuscany. On his information leaflets I read that 44 percent of people can’t tell the difference between good quality olive oil and poor. I hope I pass the test. Quality has a lot to do with the procedure of pressing the oil, and taste also with the variety of olives. It is like wine, apparently. There are many varieties, so a wide range of taste. And I’ve just always bought whatever was there on the shelf. Well, I’m in for a lesson!

On the way down we stopped to visit the Leaning Tower of Pisa. It took us a long time to find it – it’s not nearly as high as I supposed it was. But it was worth the confusion. How that tower can lean like that for a thousand years and still not fall is beyond me. It gleams light in the sun – all white marble from the nearby hills. Or was. Most of the columns have been replaced by marble from a little farther away that is more resistant to weather and climate.

We also drove by the Barilla pasta factory. I would see Barilla pasta in the Italian shopping center in Edmonton, Canada. I can buy it in Schleitheim too. Pasta means wheat – and wheat grows on some pretty steep slopes on the Italian hillsides! Robert told me that the first hillside combines in Schleitheim came from Italy. I know why now!

We’re going to go visit a farmer who also grows wheat on Thursday afternoon. He’s one of the few who speaks a little English. Serena says he’s a large farmer who grows a variety of crops, so it should be interesting.

But enough about farming. When you are in the Tuscany you’re supposed to go visit medieval towns like Florence and Sienna. We’ll do some of that too. Today it’s rainy – just perfect to visit the Roman baths nearby.

How could 2011 be a record year for sugar beet yields in Switzerland? Remember the picture I posted last May during the drought with my hand deep in a crack in a sugar beet field? And then many fields got a hard hail. Those beets seem to thrive on adversity. What saved them was a period of good rains in the nick of time and a long warm fall.

We used to grow sugar beets in Switzerland, so I was quite interested to attend the annual meeting of the Eastern Switzerland Sugar Beet Growers. I had to report on the event for the Schaffhauser Bauer, but I also wanted to hear what has happened in the industry since we left it. A lot.

When I started farming on the Emmerhof in 1978 sugar beets were still thinned by hand with the hoe. I always enjoyed that job really – the whole family was out in the field, usually the weather was nice and I could get my first good tan. There were no motors running and we could talk as we worked. The harvest was less idyllic. Robert put the beets out with a one row harvester and it took forever. Frequently it was wet and with our heavy clay soils it was a real mess, with more dirt on the beets than left in the field, it seemed. Often we sat on the pile of beets and cleaned them by hand. There are a lot of beets in three hectares!

Beets are seeded at the right distance now. Big six row harvesters do the job in a couple hours and the beets are trucked from the field to the factory. My neighbour says she doesn’t touch a beet anymore and is quite happy about that. I guess!
Continuing improvement in breeding has produced bigger beets with more sugar. What also helped is the introduction of Gaucho – an insecticide that is added to the beet seed. The environmentalists would like to see Gaucho removed again, which would be a blow for farmers.

The chairman of the meeting said the public needs to be informed why it is important for the Swiss farmer to produce sugar beets. I later asked him why – sugar beets put more oxygen into the air than trees do. Their place in the crop rotation improves the soil and breaks disease cycles. And sugar beets are one of the few crops Swiss farmers really make good money with. They’re sort of like canola for Canadian farmers.

The main attraction of the meeting was a talk by Hermann Painter, founder and CEO from ROPA Germany. ROPA designs and sells mostly harvesting equipment for sugar beets. Painter started small in the ‘70s, and now has subsidiary dealerships in France, Ukraine, Poland and Russia, and also sells into the USA and Canada. Those harvesters are a bit bigger than just six rows…Robert has decided he really wants to go out to the Ukraine now!

I’ve been watching something happening these last years, since Robert quit farming, which I think has important consequences for the next generation. It’s not unique to Robert either, which is why I want to pass this on here. He talks about it every so often, and it’s just now, as he tells me what’s happening on this new job, that I realize its potential – the role of mentor. The older farmer has a very key role to play in the lives of younger men (and women).

When it became clear that neither of our sons would come back to the farm, Robert decided he had done his time there too. There were other places and people who could profit from his experience and knowledge, new things to do. For the last seven years we’ve been going to Zambia for three months each year to work as consultants with a group of small farmers in Mpongwe. We’re not quite finished there yet. Looking back, I think the most important times were those spent with individual farmers, in their homes and fields, talking for hours on end, sharing stories and experiences. Farming in Canada is definitely different from farming in Zambia, but the general principles are the same. Not just plant and soil science, but the principles of management – on time, on standard, no wastage, with joy – as we learned in the Foundations for Farming course in Zambia. Going back year after year enabled us, especially Robert, to mentor those he worked with. We didn’t just talk about the farm either, but family and community situations.

In Canada Robert worked for several neighbours, especially during the harvest season. Most farmers make valuable employees. They’re used to working hard, thinking for themselves, and will work as if they owned what they operate. Robert enjoyed the work, liked running big new machinery that he didn’t have to pay for, and not worrying about weather and bills. He also enjoyed meal times, or long chats in the shop with the farmers, where they sometimes talked about more than machinery or weather. It was an opportunity to pass on life experience.

Now, in Switzerland, Robert is working for a friend of our son. Joel spent a harvest season with us on the farm in Canada, so they know each other. Joel started his own business with part systems for conglomerate heating systems, and needed Robert’s ability in mechanical problem solving. Robert loves it. But what he also enjoys are lunch hours spent talking about running a new business, about family and community. Again, it’s an older man sharing his life experience with a younger – a type of Godfather.

I see it happening all over. It could probably happen more. You don’t have to quit farming to be a mentor. You older farmers, men and women, have so much to share with the younger generation. And you younger men and women – don’t be afraid to find a good role model in the older farmers around you. Become their friends, ask for their advice. You don’t have to take it!

I needed a discussion group like this one 30 years ago – when I first married Robert and moved onto the Swiss family farm with him. Not just with him, but with his mom and dad, and on the weekends several of the siblings. The siblings I could handle – I was the oldest of seven kids myself. But living and working on such close quarters with my in-laws was often difficult for me, even though the Stamms are a wonderful family.

It’s not much easier to marry into a Swiss farm today. That was the topic of the farm woman forum I attended last week. Of the 16 participants, half belonged to the older generation and half to the younger. It was good to see several mother-in-law/daughter-in-law constellations in attendance. The discussions were lively, open and honest.

Marrying a farmer even in Canada isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. It usually means living in a rural, sometimes remote location, far from things like music halls and fine dining. For an urban woman with a good job, it might mean giving up a whole way of life, if the job can’t be transported to the farm. But rarely, in Canada, does the move also mean living in close quarters with his family.

In Switzerland the parents usually both live and work on the farm, as has been the way for generations. The young couple frequently live in the same house, in a separate apartment. The yard is small, compact; the house often part of the same building as the barn. Land is at a premium. There’s no extra room for two yards, for large lawns and bushes between the houses.
When a woman marries into the farm she enters a well run operation where everyone knows their place. Somewhere she must find hers. For those already on the farm, it means opening their hearts and minds and making room for her. On both sides, the move asks for understanding, tolerance, and a willing to make concessions and be flexible. Even in the best of families, there will be conflict and hurts.

“If you want it to work, it will,” said a participant. “But both sides have to want to, and be tolerant.” Married 34 years, she’d lived 27 years in the same house as her in-laws, sharing the main entrance. Now her daughter-in-law will be moving into the house, and the younger generation will take over the farm.

Making it work takes good communication. That was the main point that came out of the forum. Have regular meetings; sit down together, no cell phones ringing. Create a good atmosphere for discussion. Don’t wait until a conflict is so big it goes out of control. Don’t be afraid to ask for outside help if necessary. Be open. Don’t stay quiet to keep the peace.

We laughed a lot. Here’s a problem we discussed: “The two apartments have a connecting door. The mother-in-law keeps appearing without knocking in what was her old apartment. What does the daughter-in-law do?” Some of our answers: “Lock the door!” “Put a big closet in front of it.” “Cement it shut!” But we did agree to discuss it with the mother-in-law first. The young women at my table all claimed they wouldn’t put up with that kind of nonsense.

“There’s still so much to talk about!” one woman lamented at the end. Hopefully they will all make a point of talking about these issues with everyone involved at home.