It had been on our minds forever

How can we get to know our customers, open our doors to the public, and have an opportunity to visit & show them how we grow their food?

When the province wide opportunity came up through Facebook we jumped at the chance to get on board. Alberta Open Farm Days has a goal of promoting Ag-tourism, offers a website and listed Hoven Farms along with 150 other farms around our province. We made sure that people knew that we were on the list! We did our best to advertise sending out invitations through our Hoven Farms email list, Facebook page and our farm Instagram account.

What did we expect?

Not having participated in OFD in the past, we would have been happy to have a total of 50 people come to our farm on the weekend of Aug 17th & 18th. You blew us out of the water when 250-300 people showed up from all over the province- Calgary, Edmonton, Sherwood Park, Camrose, Red Deer, and those local to Central Alberta!

During our farm tours we explained about how we grown our organic grass finished beef, and pastured eggs. It was a joy for us to also be able to talk about our beaver dams, our rainbow trout and our soil.

What made us most happy?

Watching your excitement as you climbed onto our wagon and went for a hayride out to our pasture, having you ask key questions as Tim explained WHY- Why we manage our animals the way we do, and WHY it’s important to keep improving the soil as it is the soil that feeds our animals and our animals that feed YOU.

We loved seeing your eyes LIGHT up when you got a better understanding of the importance of taking care of our soil, which leads to healthy animals and healthy people.

You brave souls who walked our beaver dam! It was awesome to show you our massive storage of water all credit to our prolific beaver population.

Thank you to the families who brought little children with the hopes of inspiring them with what we do on the farm. You lovingly pet our chicks, you offered our dogs- Charlie & Bella lots of attention and adopted a kitten to a good home.

Thank you for taking an interest in our fish from On the Hook Fish Farm- a new, very exciting venture for us! Please check out our friend’s website at https://onthehookfishfarm.weebly.com/ if you are interested in stocking your own pond. They have fabulous service and offer great consultation when you have questions about fish.

Thank you to those who joined in our barn dance on Saturday afternoon and those who sat to listen to our live music! What a joy to see people enjoying themselves on the farm.

Did you enjoy the Hoven Farms beef burgers and the vendor tents?

We were excited to offer a few vendors who we know and love- 10 year old Monica Hoven with her handmade Party Banners, 9 year old niece Ashley offering her wooden picture holders and Gail Shantz educating people about Young Living Essential Oils.

Did you pick up a beef order at the farm?

We can’t wait to host you again, and next time please bring a friend or two. We look forward to our next visit during Open Farm Days August 15th & 16th, 2020 unless we host another event on our farm before next summer.

Let us know if you would like to visit the farm and what you would like to learn about or experience here?

Tim loves to teach. Do you have topics that you’d like to hear more about?

We would love to hear your comments below….

**A HUGE thank you to all of our 25+ volunteers for coming to our farm to help us in making our first Open Farm Days a big success! We could not have done this without you!