Pancake puzzler: Maple syrup heist baffles Quebec

Thieves in Quebec may have pulled off the sweetest heist of all time, siphoning off a reservoir of maple syrup from a warehouse and cleverly covering up their caper to evade detection, an industry group said Aug. 31. The warehouse in rural Quebec held more than $30 million worth of maple syrup, a whopping 10

Half-step for Product of Canada labels

Agriculture Canada is stepping up its promotion of a Canada Brand program to help identify Canadian food products for consumers at home and abroad. The government is supporting pilot projects in a select group of stores across the country with Canadian products marked with a special red maple leaf label. But the program only works


Fiddleheads — Free For The Picking

Some people are unapologetic foragers. They are morel hunters, berry pickers and hazelnut gatherers. Along with morels, fiddleheads are one of the most popular wild delicacies of spring, and like morel hunters, fiddlehead foragers are very secretive about their harvesting locations. Fiddleheads are the coiled, immature fronds of the ostrich fern. They acquired their name

What’s Up – for Mar. 17, 2011

Please forward your agricultural events to [email protected] or call 204-944-5762. March 17:Agassiz Lamb Co-op membership recruitment meeting, 7-9 p.m., Carman GO Office, 63-3rd Ave. NE. For more info call Randy Eros at 204-422-8723. March 17:Manitoba Rural Adaptation Council annual general meeting, Canad Inns, 2401 Saskatchewan Ave. W., Portage la Prairie. For more info visit www.mrac.ca


Facing Up To Climate Change

Avery Simundsson of Arborg was first runner-up in the senior division of the Canadian Young Speakers for Agriculture held at the recent Royal Agricultural Winter Fair. Simundsson, 21, is an engineering student at the University of Manitoba. The following is an excerpt from her speech on the topic of “What is the biggest challenge in

Move Over Maple, Birch Syrup Gets A Plug

Rocky Lake Birchworks Ltd., a family business owned by Al and Johanna McLauchlan and their sons in The Pas has received $13,189 from the federal and provincial governments to assist with market development. The McLauchlan family taps approximately 700 birch trees near their home north of The Pas. They harvested about 700 litres of birch


Send Recipes Or Recipe Requests To: – for Jul. 1, 2010

RECIPE SWAP It was a pleasure to open the mail the other day and find a package of recipes sent to us courtesy of the Anglican Church Women in Stonewall. They enclosed a photocopy of their 125th anniversary’s cookbook cover bearing the image of Stonewall’s pretty-as-a-picture Church of the Ascension. They also sent a brief

Early-Spring Delicacy Rich In Nutrition Too

“The fiddlehead’s total antioxidant activity is twice that of blueberries.” – DR. JOHN DELONG Fiddlehead greens, the young, tightly curled fronds of the indigenous wild ostrich fern (Matteucia struthiopteris), are a delectable spring vegetable and rite of the season. Fiddleheads as a food source have been well known to Canada’s First Nations for many years.


Sugaring Season Begins

The biggest April Fool is anyone who thinks it’s still winter in Manitoba. Ignore the forecasters and naysayers. The sweetest season is upon us. This is tree-tapping time, when backyard hobbyists and small commercial maple syrup makers alike sally forth to collect the sap that begins sluicing through the limbs and trunks of Manitoba maple.

Quebec’s Maple Industry Makes A Comeback

After four difficult springs, the 2009 season will go down as a historic season, with Quebec maple syrup production hitting 109.4 million pounds. Producers have been thrilled with the news, especially after they produced only half of this volume the previous year. Even though it is impossible right now to predict production for the 2010