Photo by Andrew Barton
The Day Family
The Day Family.
Just like the company’s name says, It has been more than a century since young Ephriam Arthur Day left Utah and eventually settled in the Okanagan Valley.
“He took his gun and his horse and worked odd jobs while he made his way north,” says Kevin Day, who with his sister Karin is the fourth generation of the Day family to live and work on their Benvoulin area property in Kelowna.
Like many of the long-standing family farms we have profiled this year, the Day’s farm has been through several changes to evolve with the times in order to continue their legacy.
Starting at the turn of the 19th Century, Ephriam and his wife grew vegetables, raised cattle and leased some land to sharecroppers. Their second son was severely wounded at Vimy Ridge during the First World War, but after recovering in the hospital was able to purchase the farm from his father through the War Veterans Act.
Ephriam’s five sons had five Day farms across Kelowna, all of them orchards. Today Kevin and Karin’s cousin Steve has BC’s largest pear orchard, while their own farm is second in size.
“Benvoulin is actually a niche for pears in all of Canada,” says Kevin. Apples and cherries need drainage and would not do well in heavier bottom land soil, he explains. “The stars align to grow pears in this flat area,” he says. “We still get good air flow to help with the frosts and being close to the lake gives us a heat sink.”
“Our great uncle Fred first planted pears in the late 20’s and early 30’s,” says Kevin, “But he mostly had dairy cows and dairy cows weren’t doing very well.”
Kevin and Karin’s dad George purchased the farm in 1951. He replaced the dairy cows with beef cattle, added more pears and grew sweet corn for area produce stands. “But my dad’s passion has always been livestock,” says Kevin.
Indeed, it was by default that their farm stayed in the family. “In the early ’70’s dad was thinking to sell out and buy a cattle ranch,” Kevin says. The property is very close to the city center, and developers were eying the flat land to build houses. “But the ALR came in and kiboshed that,” he says.
At 87 George still keeps about 50 beef cattle that he ranges in the hills above West Kelowna and feeds down on the farm through the winter. “He doesn’t like us planting trees on his hay land,” Kevin chuckles. “He still owns the farm and has the final say on any changes that we make.”
Photo by Andrew Barton
Pear Bins
Pear bins in the orchard.
Those changes began over 30 years ago, when Kevin started planting more pears and more corn. The Bartlett, Anjou and Bosch pears are all on Old Home and Farmingdale cross rootstocks at 7&1/2 by 16 spacing. “They still haven’t developed winter hardy dwarf rootstocks to allow for more high density plantings,” comments Kevin.
Still, he considers less than 60 bins an acre to be a “light crop”. “Our best producing block is spaced 15x20 and we get 85-90 bins to the acre,” says Kevin.
Prior to 2010, trees were brought in from Washington and Oregon nurseries. “But pears don’t like the fumigation that is required to import stock,” Kevin explains. ‘We have someone here who is growing root stock and for our last three plantings, we have been able to grow our own trees.”
George had stopped growing corn and Kevin planted an initial two acres. When his sister Karin returned to the farm, he was able to expand that to 10 acres. “I had gone to culinary school in Toronto and was working there as a chef for 18 years. My husband had passed away and I did not want to raise my son alone in the big city,” Karin explains. “I came back to the farm and thought I would continue to cook, but Kevin asked me to take over the farm stand.”
It’s been good for cash flow, as Kevin points out. “The returns come in earlier in the year and it now represents about 20% of the total farm income,” he says. “We farm 150 acres including lease land and 35 of those are planted in pears.
Forward 20 years, and the brother and sister team were at a cross roads. Pears are a minor crop in the valley and they didn’t feel they were getting the attention they needed from the BC Tree Fruits Coop. “Each year we were adding to our long term debt, and it looked like we were going to have to sell some property,” says Karin, who also manages the books for the business.
“Finally I went to Karin and said I am going to run the numbers on building our own packing house,” says Kevin. Those numbers were big, over $300,000 to construct the first packing line housed in a 10,000 sq foot building in 2010. They’ve since added 6,000 sq feet of controlled atmosphere storage.
“You find a way to make it work if you want to continue to farm,” says Karin. ”In my opinion we are not doing anything radical or new, we are just having more control and efficiency.”
Photo by Andrew Barton
Les Sheena
Les Sheena, a long time employee, picking pears.
That efficiency brought Days Century Growers 8-10 cents a pound premium over what they had been getting at the Coop. Marketing is handled by Kelowna’s Consolidated Fruit Packers, and Star Produce out of Calgary. “We had hoped the packing house would break even and we did better than that the first year,” says Karin.
“I don’t lay awake at night worrying about it anymore, though I did when we first built,” says Karin. “I know what we have done is the right thing for us and it is drawing our next generation because it is financially viable to support them.”
That’s a dilemma all through the BC fruit industry, Kevin points out. “A 10 or 15 acre orchard is not enough to support a family, so they work off farm and then it becomes really hard to run the farm to it’s full potential,” he says. “Kids look at how hard their parents have worked for so little return and they are not interested.” But the Day children are.
Kevin’s daughter Erin came home from university three years ago to run the packing house and the vegetable stand. Her husband Riley, a red seal welder, joins her there and is learning the orchard from Kevin. Karin’s son Sam is back in Kelowna still working as a heavy duty mechanic but looks to transition over to the farm full time in a couple of years. “All we need now is a carpenter,” quips Karin.
Erin’s sister Kati, who works for Interior Health while doing media for the farm, has hosted some yoga retreats and has her eye on a pear cidery.
“Seeing the kids back here has made everything we have done seem worthwhile,” says Karin. “For me that is the most important thing, that the next generation wants to be here.”
MILLION DOLLAR UPGRADE
This summer saw the final installation of Days Century Growers newest packing line in time for the end of the Bartlett Pear harvest in August. The heart of the system is a brand new pear-specific Van Wamel B.V. Perfect Ellips optical sorter.
“Ellips is a top optical sorter software company based in Holland,” explains Kevin Day, who with his sister Karin owns the packing house. World-wide, pears are a minor crop compared to apples, but they are 50% of the fruit grown in Holland. “Other companies can tune their apple machines to run pears but this Ellips is designed specifically for pears and is the first one installed in North America,“ says Kevin.
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Photo by Tom Walker
Van Wamel B.V. Perfect Ellips optical sorter
The new pear-specific Van Wamel B.V. Perfect Ellips optical sorter.
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Photo by Tom Walker
Van Wamel B.V. Perfect Ellips
The new pear-specific Van Wamel B.V. Perfect Ellips optical sorter.
“This new line will increase our efficiency by a minimum 20 per cent,” says Karin. “We can do more with the same number of people,” But most important is the increased precision over manual sorting.
“When you manual sort it is human nature to err on the side of caution, so we always had top grade fruit that didn’t make it into premium cartons,” explains Erin Day, who runs the packing line. “The optical scanner on the Ellips doesn’t make that mistake.”
The new installation supports an enhanced traceability system, as well as many additional food safety features. “We only touch each pear twice now,” says Kevin. “First when we pick it and then when we put it in the carton.”