Market vendors crops good despite the heat

By Justin Seward - Lethbridge Herald on August 8, 2023.

The consensus from vegetable growing vendors at the Lethbridge Farmers’ Market is that the crops were good despite the hotter temperatures and the lack of rain.
Trevor Aleman of Busy Bea’s Market Garden farms on the Oldman River near Fort MacLeod and is thankful for one of the river’s dams.
“That way we can get the steady supply of water and our particular farm has some of the oldest water rights in the province,” said Aleman.
“If the river goes dry, we’ll be the last ones watering and we couldn’t do it without the irrigation.”
Aleman said the heat units this year are incredible.
“So even though we had a hail storm (in) mid-June this year which totally wiped us out, the hot weather has helped us recover and we’re back to full swing,” said Aleman.
Aleman says everyone is happy with the heat.
“And put the water on, and give it enough nutrients and off we go,” said Aleman .
Aleman said sales at the Lethbridge Farmer’s Market are back to pre-COVID levels.
“Every booth is rented,” said Aleman.
“People are lining up to get the stuff and we are very happy.”
Magrath’s Crystal Spring Colony has seen their vegetables be ready for market anywhere from two weeks to a month early this year.
“Due to the warm spring we had because we went from winter right into summer,” said Ken Entz of Crystal Spring Colony.
“We’ve kind of bypassed the spring part and having that warm spring kind of pushed things further along than usual.”
However, with the heat came sun-skulled tomatoes for the Colony.
“I’ve never had sun-skulled tomatoes before,” said Entz.
“This year it showed up a bit. So it’s intense sunlight and same with the peppers and we’ve been growing those vegetables since 30-40 years and I’ve never ever seen that.”
Sun skull burns the skin of the vegetable.

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