Ontario Pork Congress prepares for 2020 at their Annual General Meeting

Oct 30, 2019
By Leslie Stewart
Assistant Editor, North American Content, Farms.com

The Ontario Pork Congress (OPC) held their Annual General Meeting on Oct 23. The meeting took place at the St. Marys Golf and Country Club in St. Marys, Ont. and was attended by over 50 people.

Highlights of the event included the election of the 2020 OPC Executive, the presentation of the Hog Jog’s record-breaking donation, and the announcement of the 2020 Ontario Pork Congress.

Meghan Kirkpatrick was elected President of the OPC for 2020.

The OPIC Hog Jog Community presented their largest donation to date ($57,000) to L’Arche Stratford at the AGM. L’Arche Stratford welcomes individuals with or without intellectual disabilities to live together in a community setting.

2020’s Ontario Pork Congress will be held June 17-18.

2020's OPC Executive

Back (left to right): Francisco Trejo (vice president), Henry Gronestege (second vice president), Kirk McLean, Brent DeVries (director)

Front (left to right): Kevin Varley (recording secretary), Kristy Perrin (director), Meghan Kirkpatrick (president), Tom Murray (treasurer)

Photo Credit: Glenn Ruegg

Video: Cleaning Sheep Barns & Setting Up Chutes

Indoor sheep farming in winter at pre-lambing time requires that, at Ewetopia Farms, we need to clean out the barns and manure in order to keep the sheep pens clean, dry and fresh for the pregnant ewes to stay healthy while indoors in confinement. In today’s vlog, we put fresh bedding into all of the barns and we remove manure from the first groups of ewes due to lamb so that they are all ready for lambs being born in the next few days. Also, in preparation for lambing, we moved one of the sorting chutes to the Coveralls with the replacement ewe lambs. This allows us to do sorting and vaccines more easily with them while the barnyard is snow covered and hard to move sheep safely around in. Additionally, it frees up space for the second groups of pregnant ewes where the chute was initially.