Making the Holidays Merrier

Christmas holly grows on trees. Holly trees, of course. And Canada’s oldest holly farm—Amblecote Estate, in British Columbia’s Cowichan Valley—is now the largest and most successful of its kind.

But it wasn’t always that way. A few years ago the 100-plus-year-old family farm ran into pest trouble, so Gaylord Stewart, the farm’s owner and operator, had to diversify to survive. “We always had animals on the farm, but never enough to sustain ourselves,” he says. “So, I got together with a few other farmers in the area and set up a roadside market stand along a busy road.”

Selling items like holly wreaths, fresh-cut flowers, local fruit and vegetables on the roadside was a success for Stewart, so he started another stand at a farmer’s market in nearby Duncan. The enterprise grew and today the farm is not only free of pests, it regularly ships holly to wholesalers across Canada.

Visit: http://www.canadianfarmersmarket.com/en/search_all_e.asp?search=Amblecote