September 2019

Hello OYF Alumni, 
 
The OOYF held it’s Regional Event on September 10th at Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show in Woodstock.  We are happy to congratulate Jan and Jony Roos of Roos Dairy Goats in Brownsville on receiving the 2019 Ontario’s Outstanding Young Farmers Award.  Jan and Jony are very busy on their farm where they milk over 2000 goats!  We are delighted to welcome Jan and Jony to the OYF family, and they will represent Ontario at the National Event in Fredericton in December.  We wish them all the best! 
 
OOYF is pleased to award the 2019 Martin Streef Memorial Scholarship to Tim Koelen from Paisley and Desiree Streef from Niagara-on-the-Lake.  These two students show leadership and passion in all that they do and we are happy to support them as they continue on their university journeys.  The National OYF Memorial Scholarship winners for 2019 are Tim Koelen from Paisley and Mikayla Ringelberg from Troy, ON.  Both students are enrolled at the University of Guelph pursing agricultural studies and are very deserving of the scholarships.  Congrats to all! 
 
The COYF National Event is just around the corner!  Dates for the National Event are December 4th-8th and will be held in Fredericton, NB.  Mark your calendars now and be sure to contact Carla Kaeding at the National Office for registration.  Carla can be reached at: kaedingc@hotmail.com .  Details on the event can be found on the national OYF website at: www.oyfcanada.com 
We hope to see you there! 
 
The OOYF committee members for the 2019-2020 year are: 
 
Please find attached the minutes of the AGM.  If you would like to help out in planning next year’s event, please let us know! 
 
Have a great fall, 
Christina Pyke 
OOYF Co-Chair 
613-561-5824

2018 National Recognition Event – Nov. 29 to Dec 2

Manitoba OYF, were certainly excited to welcome this year’s honorees, alumni and sponsors to the heart of Canada. Our host committee enthusiastically showed us just how diverse” Winterpeg” can be. They are to be congratulated on an excellent job of organizing a top notch event.  Ontario was well represented with a large turnout of our alumni members.

Thursday began with lunch and a tour of Brazen Hall Brewery, one of Manitoba’s most popular microbreweries and voted best new restaurant in 2017. From there we proceeded to Fort Gibraltar in the heart of St.Boniface, here we embraced the strong roots of the French language within Manitoba. The last tour of the day is the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, it is the only National Museum outside the City of Ottawa. The CMHR is not only an architectural masterpiece it took us on a journey of inspiration the likes of which we have not experienced before. We can highly recommend a return visit to this awe inspiring, thought provoking museum.  Rounding out this exciting day was a dinner in the South aisle of the Forks market. The Forks has been a meeting place for over 6000 years!

Some lucky alumni were fortunate enough to purchase tickets to a Winnipeg Jets hockey game against the Chicago Blackhawks.  We were not disappointed with a fast scoring game in which saw the Jets beat the Blackhawks by a narrow margin of 6 to 5.

Friday’s program included the annual meeting and the presentation of the Motherwell Award to the very deserving Rod and Shelley Bradshaw from Alberta.  The Forum topic was “Bridging the Gap in the Public Trust”.  Guest speakers gave us much to think about in our efforts to connect with the consumer.  As always the highlight of the day are the inspiring presentations by the honourees from the seven regions.  The Gala banquet ended with the announcement that Alex and Jordan McKay were one of the National Winners.  Congratulations to Willow Tree Farm!!!

Saturday’s tours took us out to the longitudinal center of Canada!  Crystal Springs Hutterite Colony, a short drive south of Winnipeg was next. Crystal Springs is a 9000 acre colony which has diversified into manufacturing including that of wood pellet barbecues and the first combination wood pellet/propane barbecue. From there we traveled East to Marchand, Manitoba, home of Canadian Gold water bottling plant. Canadian Gold won a gold medal in best sparkling water and a silver in best bottled water in 2017. In addition to bottled water they also manufacture the hugely popular Pic a Pop. Then we headed to La Bass Holsteins where Jan and Tracy hosted us for a tour of their dairy operation. Finally we landed at Artel Farms, home of Grant and Colleen Dyck. Here we experienced a Manitoba “Social” and a “sure to be an amazing” dinner prepared by Manitoba’s Ben Kramer. Some of us even enjoyed a ride on the mechanical bull!  We returned home happy that we met the challenge to “meet in the middle”.
We’re really looking forward to Fredericton New Brunswick from December 5 to 8th for the 2019 National event.

 

2018 Regional Event Update

The OYF committee is happy to report that the changes for the 2018 Regional Event were a resounding success. The event was held in conjunction with Canada’s Outdoor Farm Show in Woodstock on September 11th. Here’s what took place:

  • An OYF luncheon with finalists, alumni, and sponsors was held at the Special Events Tent on September 11th at noon. Thank you to the numerous alumni that took the time to meet the new crop of finalists.
  • Finalists presentations will started at 1pm in the Special Events tent after the luncheon.  The portion of the event was open to all farm show attendees and we will need to add more seating for next year’s event. The winner was announced following the presentations.  Please check out the “Current Winner” page for more details.
  • A formal dinner took place at the Elm Hurst Inn in Ingersoll on Tuesday evening to celebrate our finalists. Again, thank you to the many alumni who welcomed the new finalists to the OYF family.
  • The OYF AGM took place Wednesday, September 12th at 9am at the Elm Hurst.  Due to the success of the holding the event at the new venue, it was decided to continue working with the Outdoor Farm Show next year.