Efficient Agriculture and Pie-in-the-Sky Claims

Penner Farm is a farm operation that has learned about efficiencies of farming through continued expansion.  We started with a garden of large scale, where all our produce was planted and kept by hand.  All aspects were manual labor, crops tended and weeded by hand, watered by hand, harvested by hand, cleaned and packaged by hand.

As we increased our garden output, we recognized some methods that we used were inefficient.  Some examples are; the time it took to prepare the soil or, the time it took to irrigate or even the time it took to maintain the large garden in all the aspects needed to care for our growing vegetables.  The exception to "efficiency" is that to this day we still pick, wash and package by hand in order to achieve the best quality control of vegetables to market.

One of our first improvements was to create a device that hilled the soil to establish planting rows.  We first pulled our home-made hiller with an ATV.  This seemed like a BIG step in the right direction!  What could be better?  Well, we soon learned that pulling a hiller with a tractor made a bigger, taller planting row.  What we neglected to realize was that we had less space for our crops.  Why?  The tractor used more width per row being almost 6 feet wide with wide tire tracks between rows, making less use of the available garden space.  So we cleared more land.  Seems like a good solution?  Maybe not, if you don't have the infrastructure to support that increase in land use.  

Background: Field that was hand cleared. Midground: clearing in progress.  Foreground: new greenhouse and existing garden plot. - July 2020

We increased efficiencies as we changed our field row model to an intensive gardening model.  Many market garden farmers have adopted this model to great advantage.  This model also minimizes tilling in exchange for just opening the soil slightly with broad-fork or very light horizontal tilling.  This model lets the soil do what only it can do, a living system of great diversity.  This cannot be duplicated with anything man-made.  There is a symbiotic relationship between plants and soil.

Our irrigation system became too small and alot of time was spent watering by hand, either with a watering can, a sprinkler, or hose with nozzle where possible.  So we increased our irrigation capacity with a larger pump and added some rotary sprinklers.  With the wider row spacing, we soon learned that irrigating in this way was inefficient and wasteful, plus it caused some erosion between the rows.  The solution was to switch over to drip-line irrigation, placing a drip-line directly on the vegetable row and each drip-line emitter at a plant.  This proved to be a very effective method because there was a precise amount of water metered into the soil at the plant with little evaporation or unnecessary watering of non-crop areas between rows.  Each drip-line emitter has a set output per hour (0.5 gal, 0.9 gal) giving you the reassurance of accurate watering at the plant.

So where am I going with this blog? We have come to realize we can only do more with more.  Not more with less.  To be clear, we can only grow more food with more inputs of land (space), energy (water, manures and nutrients) and labor.  The inputs need to be used wisely, effectively; efficiently.  When you read a claim that says indoor or hydroponic gardening is "better than organic" gardening, find out what "better" means.  It probably doesn't mean too much.  When the newest vertical hydroponics claim to do the work of some unrealistic amount of equivalent acres of "conventional" farming, it is probably an unrealistic claim.  This isn't to say that hydroponics don't have a place in agriculture, as they do fill a large gap in the off-season where winter prevails, or in areas where agricultural land is unavailable, such as urban locations or where soil is unavailable. 

However, if you read something like the quote I saw on Facebook from a local food producer, you have in fact read something fantastic and unrealistic.

"...the infrastructure includes 945 vertical (hydroponic) towers...equivalent to 5 conventional acres, in just 2,000 square feet... production of 450kg of fresh vegetables weekly..."

This kind of claim just needs a bit of math to debunk it. One acre is 43,560 square feet. Five acres is 217,800 square feet. To whet your mathematical appetite, our yearly potato crop uses one twentieth of an acre (2200 sq ft) and can seasonally produce 125 pounds of baby potatoes and 425 pounds of full grown potatoes, (550 lb total) based on a five year average.

Think about it this way; a really good, dense head of leafy lettuce could possibly be up to a half pound grown in a tower system. If from the quoted example of 945 vertical towers you could start 10 heads (a generous estimate) of leafy lettuce per tower with a fast producing variety (best case scenario) such as a 45 day Prize-head Lettuce or a Salad-Bowl Lettuce, the math says you would only produce (945 towers x 10 heads x 1/2lb=4725 lb) in 45 days (6.5 weeks) which would be a maximum output of 725 pounds per week, only 3/4 the stated claim in the quote. But since the entity claiming this quote grows many varieties of delicate greens, in reality their output will be much less per week than stated.

Vertical tower gardening

Further, our greenhouse at 2300 square feet could easily handle 1000 heads of the same lettuce types in soil with similar timelines. To extrapolate, 945 hydro towers x 10 heads gives 9450 heads in total, or 9.5 greenhouses worth which is 22,000 square feet or 1/2 acre. Wait, did you think of that? You could theoretically place the hydro tower system in my greenhouse. No where near an equivalent 5 acres of growing space touted in the quote. Their claim is indeed, Pie-in-the-Sky.

While we continue to look for efficiencies in farming, I think we need to recognize that the newest technologies are no where near the "replacement" of traditional farming as sometimes suggested but rather, they are something to have "in-addition". We need to embrace these systems as required, knowing these technologies will have to continue to fit into the farming world when required. They will never replace traditional farming.

 Media Kit 2026

Penner Farm started as a hobby garden development on the wild and scenic Rice Lake in 2009 near Dryden, Ontario with the purchase of an old Massey Harris farm tractor, a two-bottom plow and a disc harrow. Some land had already been cleared to complete landscaping for the residence which gave an opportunity to try growing vegetables on a larger scale beyond the average garden. 

The addition of laying hens, some horses and the construction of a traditional barn made for a real farm feel! In the first few years, it did not seem like a move toward local marketing of all-natural vegetables, but a few trips to another local producer's farm stimulated interest in growing market-ready vegetables for local consumption. 

This influence brought Penner Farm to where it is today! With a commercial grade cold frame greenhouse, a heated greenhouse (hothouse) and more than 3 acres of land cleared, crop rotation and planting versatility became a reality. Additional farming equipment has been accumulated as required over the years, ensuring an efficient, quality operation at Penner Farm.

We operate our farm to provide quality vegetables and other growable goods to our local communities. Our farming methods allow us to supply the best quality vegetable varieties you can find during the relatively short growing season!

We utilize various technologies to manage growing conditions in the greenhouses and in the field. We use 2 greenhouses and raised-bed gardens, for more intensive and efficient growth.

With hard work and continued quality improvement planning, we will expand and improve our farm operation with the goal of greater production, consistent quality and crop variety over a longer season, to the benefit of you, our customer!

Heated Seedling Nursery

One hurdle in getting seeds started in the best way possible is to provide the best germinating conditions.  Having spent a decade of starting seeds in a window in the house where things are relatively constant, I have noticed that with sweet and hot pepper seeds alike, it takes more than 2 weeks for germination to occur.  Often attempting to provide warmer conditions, we have added an electric heater to the window area, created heat raps and tents, but never committed to something as simple as a seed tray heat mat, due to the fact that we would need many, and cost would make it somewhat prohibitive.

This year, we made the decision to start almost everything in the Hot House, our insulated and heated greenhouse.  With that in mind, and keeping in touch with a like-minded veggie farmer, we put together a heated seedling nursery table that is able to hold up to 8 seed trays at one time, with full control of the soil temperature, with the use of a seed tray heat mat controller.  The heating element is a simple piece of roof-eave ice-melting cable, woven into a bed of sand within the table.  The heat mat controller has a temperature sensor that is placed in the planting tray, giving an accurate temperature report to the controller.

The build is straight forward, a frame of 2x4 with a plywood bottom fastened to it.  Styrofoam is placed in the shallow table frame, then a thin layer of sand.  With the sand in place, the 60 foot long heating cable is woven back and forth along the table, anchored at each turn with simple cable tacks.  finally, sand is placed overtop the cable, filling the table level.  Once this is done, the controller can be turned on and temperature testing can be done, trays can be filled with soilless growing media and seeds and placed on the table!

Heat cable.

Sandy base.

Sprouts well along
after 12 days on the table.

Note the LED light bars and the poly cover.

This was after 5 days - Very quick results!

Greenhouse Ventilation in part

Farming is a lot of hard work.  The results are borne by the effort put into farming.  For many areas in Canada and certainly in Northwestern Ontario, the weather does not give the growing results needed.  To solve that problem, an investment often looked into is a greenhouse.  Since a greenhouse can take many forms, one needs to know what type of structure to get into. A cold frame is a good way to start or even an open ended shelter allows you more growing opportunity.  Perhaps a double poly greenhouse with an air buffer between the poly layers, a hothouse, or even a year-round greenhouse would be the ticket.

No matter what type is used, the advantage is to gain a bit more heat by trapping it in the structure.  The disadvantage is the necessary requirement to control the air temperature from getting too hot.  There are several ways to accomplish cooling on hot, sunny days.  Doors and windows on smaller greenhouses will often allow a breeze to cool it down.  Larger greenhouses including some commercial models have roll-up side panels that keep the lower zone of the greenhouse cooler.  Yet another method is to use fans and vents, forcibly exchanging the air in the greenhouse.

Our greenhouse has all three of the aforementioned methods available for cooling.  Depending on the weather, we can chose the method that works best.  When the weather is hot and sunny and there is no breeze, the fan and vent method is the only way to keep it cooler in the greenhouse.  Over the last few weeks, we have been designing a more efficient fan and vent control system.  Our greenhouse has two 42" cabinet fans that can be run at low or high speed.  We also have two powered vents at the opposite end of the greenhouse.  Typically, the fans would start together, the vents would open, and the greenhouse would start to cool.  On days where the weather is cool but the sun is hot, full fan and vent is not required, but rather maybe one fan running slowly would be enough.  An average day with sun and cloud can become problematic, too.  Full speed fan operation might create too much change too quickly.  So now for the technical side of things!

The decision to design the new control system comes from the desire to keep the plants in the greenhouse from being shocked by a sudden or rapid temperature change.  The engineering behind the function is to run the fan and vent system in four logical steps.  When the temperature gets too warm in the greenhouse, one vent opens and one fan on low speed starts up.  If that doesn't satisfy the control parameters, the second fan starts on low speed with the second vent opening.  Should the parameters still not be met, one of the fans goes to high speed and finally the second fan would go to high speed if required.  Essentially, this is a cascade control for ventilation.

In the construction of the system controls, each stage is operated by individual temperature sensors and adjustable controls.  This will allow for customizing the ventilation where one side of the greenhouse might get hot more quickly than the other side, or on the cool down, one side cools before the other.  A combination of NTC sensors and bimetallic sensors should allow for a smooth operation.  Sensor locations can be adjusted to meet the canopy level of the plants and are generally placed mid-greenhouse to minimize airflow disturbances.  Further to that, the NTC sensors are placed inside perforated pipe (Buffer Tubes) to keep the temperature sensing from becoming erratic.  Most of the equipment used we have been able to recycle, reuse or at least, use part of.  Two of the controllers we are using are new and extremely accurate.  Items like the controller enclosure were salvaged from an industrial site demolition.  Finally, we have independent wireless temperature/humidity sensors that we can monitor via a smart phone app to keep a watchful eye on the system.  Below are some photos of the ventilation equipment.

Hopefully you can make sense of what I am writing about in this blog update from the farm.  If you want to check it out in person, a tour would definitely be in order!

Control Box Wiring

Control Box Front Panel

Power Operated Vents

Sensor/Buffer Tube

SW Cabinet Fan

NW Cabinet Fan and Control Box

Soil. What about it?

Recently, I have found an interest in the area of deglaciation. That is to say, the mystery of what happened here thousands of years ago gave shape to what can be seen here today. Our farm sits on mostly clay/silt, but has a few bands of sand here and there as well as some random rocks thrown in where you least expect them. Those rocks have often been unearthed with the tractor and plow, though one was found with a new set of blades on our riding mower. Ooops. 

What can be seen specifically in our yard is banding of different soil types as it settled, presumably after being washed out of the retreating Laurentide Glacier and then being settled by the ancient glacial Lake Agassiz. It is hard to picture in your mind as you stand in the yard, a wall of ice, melting and crumbling away, perhaps hundreds of feet high where your house now sits. The random rocks would have been bulldozed by the glacier off the higher rocky prominences in the area, only to fall off the edge of the glacier as it melted in later times. Speculation, it may be, but we do have glaciers today that have shown us how they behave. It can make a person feel pretty small in the world, but maybe moreso blessed to be witness to the evidence! 

 Our farmyard is a soil called Orthic Gray Luvisol, for the most part.  I know the Poplar trees like it and thrive in this soil, as do the Moose Maple and Balsam trees. That being said, it grows a good crop of beans and with a bit of biomass such as the rotted overburden of needles, leaves and such, potatoes love the soil as well as much of our selected crops. Then there is this very interesting but oh, so stubborn hard-pan layer that sits below the top level of soil. It is made of calcium carbonate - the same stuff that makes well water hard. It prevents rain water from going deep into the soil and gives our farm a problem with rainfall runoff. So last year we purchased a big, chisel like device for the tractor called a middle-buster. It can penetrate the hard pan with a bit of effort, giving much needed drainage and also causes some of the calcium carbonate to return to the growing soil which is of benefit to the crops. 

Apart from the farm, the Dryden area can reveal the glacial evidence in other ways. There are very cool features on the shores of Wabigoon lake called "varves" in the clay banks. Basically the layers that were built up over the centuries of glacial melt. You can also find moraines (large gravel features that run for many kilometers at a time) as well as eskers which make some beautiful sandy/gravelly "varves" as well. This photo was taken East of the farm, in a gravel pit. The layers are incredible!

Also, a little closer to home is this massive boulder, all by itself amongst much smaller clast (broken rocks) on a clay hillside. It is quite amazing, being that it is approximately 20 feet by 16 feet wide and 8 to 10 feet high!  Just think, the glacier carried it to that spot!

Enjoy your time outside and keep your eyes open! You never know what interesting thing you might find!

Additional Land Cleared

 With apologies, this blog has been unreasonably inactive for 2 years.

Farming takes alot of time and blogging was something that got neglected for the media presence of our farm.  It was easier to satisfy the masses on our other SMPs, those being Instagram and Facebook, so you could go there to get a snippet of the farm activities.

But today I will provide a quick overview of the post-market activities on the farm, that made for a busy September and October.  We cleared land.  More land.  Scrubby and mostly unused land.  Land that makes a person growl as they walk in it because the scrub and Moose Maple makes for unpleasant movement within. Largely unforested, there were a few Poplar trees, some ratty Balsam trees and two beautiful White Spruce trees.  I saved the White Spruce and landscaped around them to create an island in the middle of the working field area.  It will be a bit inconvenient when using equipment but the aesthetic of it will be of much greater value!

Most of the scrub, stumps and weeds were moved, sifted and set to be burned off to the side.  Piles of soil that were previously placed in this area were spread out over the opened ground.  Any remaining sticks were hand picked and added to the burn piles and the piles were lit off.  Remaining ash and soil was pushed back onto the open ground, then I brought in the 2-bottom plow and turned the opening over to allow winter's cold to break down the soil in a way only nature can.

Tree Island at Right

Plowing Complete

Tractors and Plow

This clearing operation gave an extra 3/8 of an acre to the total field size and eliminated some unmanaged piles of dirt as well as becoming one open area with ease of management for the future of the farm.  For the coming 2023 farm season, this new area should be full of Sweet Corn, Squash and Black Oil Sunflowers.  I am anxious to get back to the soil!

Oat harvest in November!?

 November 10th, about 2 months later than average for a typical harvest.  Last week turned out to be so warm and sunny, the field became too soft to run equipment in it, so I waited until we got some sub zero temperature to stabilize the soil.  So minus 2 and sunny, I got the combine harvester out and went to work.

https://youtu.be/krlD0Se2SLA

This aspect of agriculture is the most unfamiliar to me as I have never used the combine in the field, only ensured the unit worked from a mechanical aspect in the yard.  Because my oats were drying by virtue of freezing, the stalks were green near the ground, even though the tops were gold.  Combines don't process green stalks without plugging up, so I did have to learn how to clear some plug-ups.   (Always be sure to power down your equipment and take all safety measures.)

A good crop of this size should yield about 30 times the amount of seed planted.  This late season crop was never going to be a high yielder, but it did give about 4 times the amount planted.

https://youtu.be/u_bTw_sr8yg

Once off the field I needed to unload the tank, so off to the barn to find a bin for storage.  If I keep growing oats, I will need to get a storage bin for sure!  This is a clip of part of the unload.

https://youtu.be/4ZIcfCgfRxI

In the end, the oat straw was a bit too green(damp) to bale, so I took it off the field loose instead of baling it.  Will let it sit in the barn for a week to dry, then bale it and put it up in the mow.

This is the last bit of harvest work for the year.  Snow is coming tonight and now time is going to be used for winter projects, maintenance and planning for 2021.  Farming is indeed dictated by nature; we can only put in our best effort when the weather lets us!