The Bushels for Broken Arrow initiative is making its return to a couple of southeast Saskatchewan farms this harvest season.
Bushels for Broken Arrow supports the Broken Arrow Youth Ranch, a Christian ministry in the Wood Mountain area that provides children with a safe, loving home in a farm setting, while parents seek out the help and recovery they need. Former Estevan resident Todd Moroz and his wife Lara are on staff.
Participating farms in Bushels for Broken Arrow this year are the Lievaarts by Outram, who planted 40 acres for Broken Arrow this year, and the MacKenzie Farms near North Portal, which seeded 60 acres to support the ministry.
It’s a program that began three years ago. Canterra Seeds came on board with the seed for 40 acres of land.
This year marks the third year the MacKenzie Farm has been part of the initiative, and it’s the second year for the Lievaarts.
“The MacKenzie farm actually planted the same kind of seed that they did the first year, the AAC-Cameron, and that was the very first type of seed that Canterra donated to us, and then the Lievaarts this year planted a durum crop, which is called Credence,” said Moroz.
Bushels for Broken Arrow has been huge boost for the ministry. It’s become their largest fundraising campaign of the year. Their participation in the Estevan Strippers hockey tournament in April is successful, too, but not as much as the harvest initiative.
The MacKenzies and the Lievaarts are happy to be part of it as well.
“Every person there has become part of the Broken Arrow family, because they may not be the folks right on site (at the ranch), but the ministry couldn’t exist without them. They definitely have a stake in what Broken Arrow does.”
Representatives from Broken Arrow were in the southeast last week to serve harvest meals for the farm families, with support from the Southern Plains Co-op.
They had representatives of some of the farm input companies in attendance as well, along with people from the Southern Plains Co-op. A representative from Nutrien was at the Lievaart farm, too.
At the Lievaart farm, 19 people were present, and at the MacKenzie farm there was 15.
“There were some good crowds, lots of visiting, and when it came time to wrap it up, they did it quick, because they needed to get back into the field,” said Moroz.
With the weather conditions that were in the forecast for the coming days, it only fuelled the desire of the farmers to get back into the fields.
