There were big ones, small ones, some with colour and others with odd shapes.
Farmers gathered at Brent Kelly Farms in East Ladner last Thursday for the annual B.C. Potato Variety Trail Field Day to see new varieties that have been grown in a test field. The goal is to see if any could become a viable crop in Delta.
There's already a wide variety of different types of spuds farmers can choose from - including Kennebec, Warba, Russet and Fingerling - and the field trial saw an interesting new selection that have market potential in the categories of reds, whites, yellows as well as Russets. Many are new to the region and some of the varieties were developed by Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and various breeding programs.
Farmers from B.C. and other provinces, as well as the U.S., were joined by food retail representatives at Thursday's event to see if the new varieties are not only viable as far as Delta's growing conditions, but also whether consumers could ultimately be interested in buying them. Those that show initial promise are put through storage trials and test kitchens. Having different sizes, shapes and textures, the potatoes on display were given such names as Elfe, Jazzy, Erika and Christina. They sat in clusters, unwashed on the ground, for an initial visual inspection.
"What's happened with this trial, originally it was the growers who would just come and look at the potatoes and say, 'Ya, this is interesting.' But now what we have is early generation seed growers, midgeneration seed growers, commercial growers, we have BC Fresh who sells, we have BC Fresh's customers - Loblaws, Sobeys - they're here," explained Heather Meberge with ES Cropconsultant Ltd., the firm that planted the spuds.
"So, ultimately it's the people buying the potatoes that we want to know what they want. So if Loblaws, let's say, could say to their growers, 'Can you grow a little bit? Let's see how this looks,' she added.
Longtime potato farmer Peter Guichon said they are looking for potatoes that grow well in Delta's soils, but it's also important to have the types customers want.
"If they don't sell at retail, the stores don't order it back from you. It's got to look good," he said.
The field trials have been held at several Delta farms over the past decade. Support for the 2015 trial came from the Clusters Initiative of the Growing Canadian Agri-Innovations Program in partnership with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, the Canadian Horticulture Council and the B.C. Potato and Vegetable Growers Association.
The potato industry in this province is worth over $30 million.
It's an important one for Delta with the community producing around half of the crop on over a quarter of the municipality's active farmland.
