While we value local purchasing and farm-to-table consumption more than ever, The Press hits the road again this summer to meet craftsmen and agricultural workers. Third portrait in a series of six with members of the Desgroseilliers family from Jardins Purdélys, a pioneer farm in organic vegetable production in Quebec.
Posted at 11:00 a.m.
Arriving at Jardins Purdélys, it is enchanting to see so many houses surrounding the farm land. Especially since you can see the skyscrapers of downtown Montreal in the distance.
“We all know our neighbours,” launches production manager Denis Desgroseilliers.
The dozens of families in Saint-Isidore-de-Laprairie who have a field in the Jardins Purdélys as their backyard can see around twenty fruits and vegetables grow: lettuce, strawberries, cauliflower, kalepotatoes…
What distinguishes the Purdélys Gardens: they produce organic in large quantities. It is the largest organic vegetable farm in Quebec, so much so that part of the harvest even goes to the United States.
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
The farm is in the heart of the village.
“Our model remains quite unique, agrees Denis Desgroseilliers. Large-scale organic farms, there are very few. »
For Montrealers, the products of Jardins Purdélys meet the definition of “eating local”, since the land is barely 15 kilometers from the Mercier Bridge.
A family story
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
Les Jardins Purdélys is the largest organic vegetable farm in Quebec.
The Purdélys Gardens are a family business. Denis Desgroseilliers and his brothers François and Michel manage the farm. His parents and his wife Geneviève Rodier also work there, while his brother Louis devotes himself to Domaine Labranche, which is a vineyard, an orchard and a sugar shack all rolled into one.
The Desgroseilliers family has quite a story! Their ancestor is Médard Chouart des Groseilliers, legendary woodsman who enabled the first ship to reach Hudson Bay from the north.
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
In the fields of the Jardins Purdélys, you can see around twenty fruits and vegetables growing.
“He could neither read nor write, so it was above all his comrade Radisson who was quoted in the story,” explains Denis.
Médard Chouart took part in the creation of the Hudson’s Bay Company and it was his great-grandson, Joseph Prosper, who cleared the land of Saint-Isidore-de-Laprairie and gave it its vocation. agricultural.
The challenges of organic
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
Marcel Desgroseilliers and Marie-France Lohé
Generations later, Marcel Desgroseilliers and his wife Marie-France Lohé took over the farm.
“The most beautiful of my sons is on vacation,” says Marcel Desgroseilliers with his delicious deadpan sense of humor. And my daughter has turned out badly: she is a doctor. »
Denis’ parents are a very nice couple. “Even after 42 years, there isn’t a day when I tell myself that I wouldn’t choose him again,” Marie-France tells us.
Her greatest pride as a mother? “Let everyone be happy in the company and passionate. »
“Passionate” is without a doubt the right adjective to describe his son Denis.
It was in 2009 that the Purdélys Gardens made the organic shift after years of transition. “20 years ago, there was little knowledge and models in Quebec and Canada. We took a trip to California, and it was a revelation,” he says.
To grow organic, however, you need a high tolerance for risk. “We work with nature, and it’s a lot of prevention. »
Walking through a row of struggling vegetables turns your heart upside down!
Denis Desgroseilliers
The unexpected and challenges are part of the daily life of organic market gardeners. “But each time, we find solutions. »
All of the glitches resolved form valuable baggage. Denis cites as an example a batch of broccoli seeds that had been infested in the summer of 2018.
Discouraged, the Desgroseilliers thought of abandoning the cultivation of vegetables that make their mark today. But finally, they started a research project with a plant pathology researcher from the PRISME consortium (a group of market gardeners and professionals). The latter had developed the testing of semen samples with a PCR-type device.
Challenges and ideas for the future
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
Denis Desgroseilliers
When Denis’ father, Marcel Desgroseilliers, studied at the Institut de technologie agroalimentaire du Québec in Saint-Hyacinthe in the 1970s, he was both a rebel and a grano when he dreamed of organic farming.
“It was by choice and by conviction, but we had to remain realistic,” he explains.
His son has the same values. You have to aim for an ideal, but you also have to be profitable. “In the early years, the financial statements were in the dark red,” he says.
PHOTO FRANÇOIS ROY, THE PRESS
For Montrealers, the products of Jardins Purdélys meet the definition of “eating local”, since the land is barely 15 kilometers from the Mercier Bridge.
“I have lots of friends who have small-scale farms, but there is an incredible workload. »
For Denis, the future lies in the consolidation of farms and in the development of automated technologies that can make up for the lack of manpower. “Getting together allows volume,” he explains.
If there is a craze for organic products, he underlines, it is a market that is still very limited, between 2 and 3% of the volume. “It’s growing, but it remains a niche. »
It also often happens that he sells organic vegetables in the “conventional” market. And the competition is strong with the products of California which does not remunerate its workers as well as in Canada.
However, Denis Desgroseilliers insists on one point: the more you grow organically, the less you can go back.