‘Lifelong dream’ polished by goat milk soap

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/09/2024 (694 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If you learn only one thing about Aurora Farm, co-owner Louise May wants it to be it’s a woman-owned business that exists in part to empower the next generation of female farmers.

Located in St. Norbert, Aurora has become a successful small-scale farm over the past two decades. Staff members are committed to helping the public connect with animals and the land.

The farm is also a place where May lives out her feminist values. In her university days, making a difference meant organizing protests and participating in letter-writing campaigns. Today, it means running a farm where staff are community-minded and practice sustainability.

“I was able to fulfill a lifelong dream of creating a farm and once I started sinking my teeth into it, I realized it was much better to demonstrate and educate than to be simply a critical voice,” May said Friday, adding: “Critical voices are very, very important, too.”

May was the full-time executive director at the St. Norbert Arts Centre when she took possession of the 160-acre plot of land Oct. 1, 2004.

At first, it was a place where her then-13-year-old daughter, Zona Bresch, could ride horses. May got into agriculture a few years later when she bought some dairy goats.

Today, Aurora Farm manufactures more than 10,000 bars of goat milk soap annually. The soap is sold at the farm’s on-site general store, local retailers and Sobeys grocery locations. The farm also manufactures a line of natural wellness products.

The gardens at Aurora Farm are chemical-free and produce culinary and medicinal herbs for sale through Fireweed Food Co-op and as dried herbs throughout the year in the general store.

The farm is solar-powered, with large-scale composting and rain-water collection systems, wetland rebuilding, ecosystem diversification and tree-planting. Additionally, the farm hosts a variety of programs where the public can learn new skills and connect with the animals.

These programs include regular soap-making workshops and a week-long summer camp where young people can learn skills such as horseback riding, goat milking and gardening.

The farm also hosts a popular goat yoga program that allows participants to connect directly with animals while doing their downward-dog and warrior poses.

The farm has a reconciliation action plan that includes taking care of rare Ojibwa horses — fewer than 200 are estimated to be left in the world — and inviting Indigenous people to pick free ceremonial tobacco from the property.

The farm employs six people year-round, with an additional six joining the staff in the summer. In recent years, Bresch and her friend, Aynsleigh Kerchak, have joined May in the ownership group.

“Getting to grow up on the farm was a pretty special experience for me,” said Bresch, a high school English teacher. “My mom wanted to give me that experience, then the farm has turned into giving everyone that experience, too. It’s a pretty cool evolution.”

Kerchak joined the farm nine years ago, shortly after completing a university degree in linguistics. Working at Aurora was supposed to be a short-term arrangement, but she now serves as general manager.

“It’s never a dull moment,” she said. “I really love teaching people and leading workshops and it’s fun to see people interacting with the animals and getting comfortable with them.”

The public is invited to visit Aurora today and Sunday as the farm celebrates its 20th anniversary.

It will be open from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. both days for a variety of activities including tours, horseback riding demonstrations, a maker’s market, seed collecting, scavenger hunts and animal visits.

Admission is $5 per person; children five and under can visit for free. Tickets can be purchased upon arrival or in advance at aurorafarm.ca/20.

“(The farm is) a project that’s taken a long time to come to fruition,” May said.

“I kind of feel like we got somewhere and I want it to be able to be a positive influence on society.”

aaron.epp@freepress.mb.ca