Manitoba Co-operator

Birds settle in the birdhouse on Linda Maendel’s property this spring.

Summer of the swallows

The ups and downs of bird watching, from nest to fledgling

In our front yard, there is an old barn. It’s a little smaller than its full-scale cousins that still smatter Manitoba’s landscape. This one is in a tree. Small changes to a long-abandoned birdhouse was all it took to attract new feathered residents. A remnant of a school project from bygone years, the barn’s red


Rowley was emaciated and in poor health when he arrived at the colony. Here he’s seen early on the road to recovery.

The life of Rowley

How an injured dog found its way into the heart of a Hutterite colony

You can’t change a dog’s past,but you can rewrite the future.– Agnes Carass Looking out any window of our house, I’m bound to see one or more of the dogs that live at our Hutterite community in southern Manitoba. The dogs are all shapes, sizes, colours and breeds: collie, terrier, poodle, German shepherd and American

This red and grey rug will long be a reminder of the coronavirus lockdown and the simple tasks that made it easier.

Work of our hearts

Trying times like these mean small comforts can take you a long ways towards greater inner peace

“When our eyes see our hands doing the work of our hearts, the circle of creation is completed inside us, the doors of our souls fly open and love steps forth to heal everything in sight.” — Michael Bridge With COVID-19 hanging over the entire world like a depressing grey cloud, I am quite content

Young Terry Maendel, the author’s nephew, continues a long tradition of pitching in at the colony garden.

An heirloom harvest spurs memories

Some of my fondest memories as a young woman are of helping my Aunt Kate Basel and Uncle Josh Vetter in the colony garden

As long as the earth remains, there will be planting and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night.” — Genesis 8:22 On a Hutterite colony, typically one couple is in charge of the vegetable garden. They’re the ones who decide what will be planted, when the garden needs weeding or produce is


Jakobi Maendel, five, loves to help gather the sap. 


Maple syrup ritual spurs childhood memories

When my sister makes maple syrup every spring, she also recreates treasured memories from my childhood

Every spring a corner of our backyard is transformed into a scene that could be from Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House books. Two columns of bricks create a makeshift stove, over which giant rectangular pans sit atop a steel table-like structure. Barrels of scrap hardwood, collected throughout winter at our carpenter shop especially for this,

group of schoolchildren recycling

Earth Day should be celebrated every day

A Manitoba Hutterite Colony takes on the challenge of ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’

“I think I’ll be counting bags in my sleep tonight,” a seventh-grader chuckled. A group of us were on the floor in my classroom, around a mountain of plastic bags we were counting for the Bag Up Manitoba program. Since getting involved in this program some years ago, the most our school ever collected was

Thy Neighbour As Thyself

The disturbing news that our provincial government had decided to breach the Hoop ‘n’ Holler bend in order to take pressure off the weakening Assiniboine River dikes raised mixed feelings. “Why do we have to be the scapegoats?” one area resident protested. Another wondered, “How can they decide to sacrifice my land to spare others’



Potato Harvest On The Colony

Trucks are waiting! Everybody welcome. Thank you!” The crisp message rings from the public address system, inviting colony members to a shift of picking weeds and lumps of dirt out of newly harvested potatoes travelling by conveyor into the shed. “This is a recorded announcement!” one of the young women deadpans. Grabbing gloves and a