Scotian Gold Country Store would like to feature Doris and Charles Keddy from Keddy Nurseries this month as our featured farmers. 

Doris and Charles Keddy bought their first farm in 1977.  At that point, Charles had spent 9 years working with Gilbert Allen, who specializes in propagating strawberry plants for the U.S. and Canadian markets.  Encouraged by Gilbert to get into farming and help meet the growing demand for Nova Scotia grown strawberry plants, Charles and Doris took on the challenge with enthusiasm and lots of hard work.  They used a pitchfork to hand dig their first harvest of 300,000 strawberry plants in the fall of 1979.

Today, machines do the digging and a good thing too, as Keddy Nurseries harvested 19 million strawberry plants last year.  During the season, up to 75 people are employed and 350 acres of land is worked.  The business has expanded beyond the propagation of just strawberry plants to include raspberry canes, asparagus crowns, high bush blueberries and rhubarb roots.

Two thirds of the strawberry plants propagated on Keddy Nurseries farm are destined for Florida.  In fact, 25% - 30% of the strawberry plants grown in Florida are sourced from Nova Scotian companies.  Our unique fall climate is instrumental in the development of sought after, high quality plants.  Our shorter, cooler fall days, result in producing strawberry plants that come into production early in the Florida growing season.  As well, our Nova Scotian strawberry plants are disease free.

Five years ago, Doris and Charles looked at sweet potatoes as another crop option on the farm.  Charles states they were interested in sweet potatoes because they were told the crop couldn’t be grown in Nova Scotia.   That’s all Charles needed as motivation and he proved the sceptics wrong when they harvested 7 acres of sweet potatoes last year.  With plans to continue to grow and expand this crop, Keddy Nurseries is working on building drying kilns and harvest and packing infrastructure needed to support the sweet potato crop.

Doris and Charles’ son Phillip now represents the second-generation farmer at Keddy Nurseries.  In addition to working with strawberries and sweet potatoes, Phillip has been testing perennial nursery plants with a small acreage test plot on the family farm.

What is Doris and Charles secret to success?  Charles says they like the challenge and are willing to take the risk to try just about anything.  They don’t rule any new opportunity out without taking a close look at it and have learned by doing throughout their entire farming career.  Charles says risk can be expensive and requires a lot of effort, but in most of Charles & Doris’ experiences, the risk has paid off.  

Charles’ experience from over 35 years in the industry is sought out by strawberry growers from all over North America who look to Charles as a valuable resource on growing techniques.  Charles is a past president of the North America Strawberry Association, past president of the Nova Scotia Federation of Agriculture and current chair of Agri-Futures Nova Scotia, Vice Chair of the Annapolis Valley Land Trust and still has time to devote to his church and community.