Planting 101 at UPick farm

Business Day recently sat down with UPick’s General Manager, Lee- Anthony Walker and its Operations Manager, Verrick Jaundoo, to find out more about this and other initiatives being undertaken at the 100-acre farm.

Seated under the leafy shade provided by a large bamboo patch opposite the farm’s small retail space, Walker explained what inspired him to develop the concept of “Planting 101”.

“I was hired four months ago to promote the business more; I come from a background of managing night clubs and I own my own catering company. I spent the first three months observing the operation and one of the things I realised is that growing your own plants isn’t rocket science. Based on feedback, I decided we should start offering this as a new service.”

Walker would like to hold the first class later this month (August), provided certain logistics are worked out in the next two weeks or so.

He explained how “Planting 101” lessons would be broken down into simple terms and easy-to-follow steps, so that people don’t feel intimated.

“Anyone can participate, from children to senior citizens. We’re going to give you a pot, we’re going to teach you soil preparation - why, how it’s necessary, what kind of soil you use and why. Then we’re going to let you choose a seedling and you plant it in your pot. What we’re working out is if (training) would be every two weeks or every month because you’d have to bring your plant to each session; likely on a Saturday morning.”

Jaundoo added to that, telling Business Day that having your plant there is necessary “so that we can see if you’re learning, if you’re taking care of the plant properly. You can also compare your plant to your classmates’ and find out from them what they’re doing differently. This make things fun and interactive.”

The company stays connected with customers through its Facebook page; www.facebook.com/upicktt, where each week, it posts a list of the vegetables ready to be picked.

Walker said UPick’s mandate is that all activities/services there must be family-friendly. This includes the farm’s first-ever Halloween pumpkin-carving event in 2016. This actually came about due to customer demand; they had to import the variety of pumpkin most-suited to carving. UPick plans to hold another pumpkin-carving family day for Halloween this October.

That’s not all. UPick is working on a plan to hold star-gazing events, where an astronomer or someone equally knowledgeable “can tell people exactly what they’re looking at and how constellations got their names. We are an ideal location for this kind of thing because there are no artificial lights to (impede) your view of the night sky,” Walker said.

While most people know Chaguaramas for hiking, boat rides ‘down d islands’, its beaches and fetes at venues overlooking the water, UPick’s presence has attracted the agricultural-minded and those looking to get their vegetables as fresh as possible - picking it right off of the plant.

Jaundoo said their weekend clientele often includes families headed home after a “dip at Macqueripe Beach, hikers and bikers. We also get people who, from whatever reason, don’t reach the market and they’re looking to get some fresh produce.”

There are several restaurants and hotels dotted along the Western Peninsula. Walker added to Jaundoo’s point, telling Business Day that because UPick harvests each week’s crop on a Thursday, “chefs who work in the area; and a few from outside, stop by on Thursday afternoons. As we add more items that you don’t usually get in Trinidad, more chefs are coming to us. Meanwhile, we tend to get more elderly people coming by on Saturdays and Sundays.”

The farm also gets lots of school tours. Jaundoo shared that students from urban areas are usually surprised to learn where their food comes from.

“When they see bodi growing on the vine and not in a bundle on a grocery shelf, they’re stunned. Some children have also seen tomatoes growing on the plant and called them apples. So, what we’re doing here is serving to educate some children about the food chain.”

Speaking about their adult customers, Jaundoo told Business Day that people who come from an agricultural background “tend to come here for our sweet corn, cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, jalapeños, red ochro, purple sweet pepper and now, asparagus – ‘exotic’ items that you don’t typically find in the market.”

He explained that while UPick grows some of the popular local crops - baigan, bodi and ochro to name a few; because customers are going to want to pick what they commonly eat, the farm doesn’t want to compete with local farmers.

Hence the focus on the aforementioned ‘exotic’ items. This includes baigan varieties not typically grown here. Namely the Star Light which is short, round and dark purple in colour, and the Japanese variety which is long, thin and light purple in colour.

UPick currently sells local honey but it plans to start offering its own honey too in the coming months. The apiary was set up in early June at the far end of the farm; beyond the acres of sweet corn.

“We have honey ready to take out but because of the recent heavy rains, the bees haven’t really been able to venture into the bushes to get nectar. So, we left the honey for them to feed on in the meantime but as soon as the weather improves, we will harvest our honey. Likely at the end of August into September. Selling our own honey was one of the owner’s (Joseph ‘Joe’ Pires) ideas. He wanted to add honey because Tucker Valley is known to produce some of the best honey (due to) the nutmeg trees and other flowering plants which make for good quality honey,” Jaundoo said.

UPick’s prices are lower than in your typical supermarket but a little higher than in the market. Walker said he has started stocking ground provisions and plantain in their retail store because those customers who don’t reach the market have been asking for potatoes, yam, et cetera.

“On a Thursday morning, I go up to the Farmers’ Market in Macoya and purchase those items that we don’t grow, so that our customers can do their ‘Sunday market’ here if they haven’t reached the market yet. This allows them to save a trip to the grocery and to save some money in the process because our prices would be closer to that of the market than what supermarkets would charge.”

Walker was keen to point out that he buys locally grown provisions et cetera “because we want to support local farmers. At the end of the day, we’re all farmers.

The farm originally opened from Tuesday to Sunday, 7 am to 2 pm. While its opening hours remain the same, due to visitor habits, UPick is now open from Thursday to Sunday.

UPick opened on August 8, 2015. It is operated by Chaguaramas Farms Limited (ChagFarms), which signed a 30-year lease with the Chaguaramas Development Authority (CDA). ChagFarms is a subsidiary of Caribbean Chemicals and Agencies Limited, whose Managing Director is Pires.