By Andria Carlyon

As a farm grown kid, it is sometimes a struggle to adjust to life in the city; the crowds, the sirens, the traffic, the neighbours, the roommates… it way busier and nosier than what I grew up with. I do appreciate some of the perks of living in the city such as friends to visit from my years at university, always new movies being played at the theatre, some places you can find free comedy, you can discover awesome new foods, see lots of dogs if you walk to a park, nice trails to jog on, but… it still can’t quite compare to the serenity of living in the country.

While working full-time in the agriculture industry in crop research, I have found that technology has been a great way for me to remain connected to the farm. Both Mom and Dad will text or call about what’s happening on the farm such as the new chickens arriving, or send photos of their day, like a new calf or a porcupine they found. It is through their messages and photos that I stay in the loop of the weekly activities and get to enjoy a little bit of the farm views.

The majority of the pictures this spring, however, have all been related to the amount of precipitation we have received!

The fall was wetter than normal, which led to a lot of moisture frozen in the soil. And THEN, the absurd amount of rain and snow we have gotten in April has over-filled all of our dugouts, ditches have transformed into mini rivers and created major mud holes in our pastures, which destroys it for future grazing this summer. My dad spends a fair amount of time each spring creating little streams and unplugging ditches to get water out of the corrals and draining puddles in the pastures, and this spring was no exception! In fact, there was so much water and snow-melt that some way more time and puddle draining had to occur.  

While the weather has not been the most desirable, I still love seeing the photos, getting the updates and hearing which cow dad thinks is going to calve next. It gets me through the week until the weekend, when I can hopefully go home for the weekend and see everything for my self!