​Huron Bruce Nature welcomes market gardener Tamara McMullen

Even with winter weather poised to descend upon Lake Huron, fresh vegetables are still available, thanks to a local, certified organic farm.

Tamara McMullen of Huron County-based Firmly Rooted Farm, brought crates of fresh root vegetables to the Point Clark Community Centre, Nov. 25, for the regular meeting of the Huron Bruce Nature Club. McMullen, a self-described plant geek since childhood, shared her passion and enthusiasm for growing organic, nutrient-dense food with amazing flavour, to a rapt audience of about 70 club members.

McMullen and her partner, Brian Wiley, established their farm in 2013, but began their journey years earlier when they met at the University of Guelph’s landscape architecture program. They discovered in each other a mutual love of food, the physical world, and feeding community.

After graduation and through a training program at Everdale teaching farm, they were introduced to dozens of small-scale farmers successfully providing community with nutritious food, and decided they could do so too.

McMullen currently feeds 200 families per week on three-and-a-half acres grown intensively and sustainably on their farm in Belgrave. She shared many of their farming practices, including the use of “hoop houses,” structures that allow the farm to produce salad greens and root vegetables for three-and-a-half seasons.

Soil health is of utmost importance to their approach, and they use a variety of methods to keep it healthy - nutrient testing, seed meals from natural sources, reduced tillage, crop rotation, and using compost mulch.

McMullen touched on their pest-management strategies to control harmful insects but which include fostering beneficial ones as well. The farm is planted with hedgerows full of native trees, shrubs and plants which attract, house, and feed beneficial insects. Their bio-diversity strategy even includes a dug pond and mini-forest. The resultant habitat on the postage stamp-sized land is full of honey bees, hundreds of frogs, salamanders, toads, nesting turtles and birds. Firmly Rooted is an oasis of diversity in a landscape of surrounding mono-culture.

Several club members were fortunate to win produce in a door prize draw and after the presentation, many others took advantage of the opportunity to purchase fresh, vibrantly-coloured vegetables grown on this productive, healthy farm.

In other club business, James Turland promoted the 2025 Kincardine Christmas Bird Count, taking place Dec. 18. He shared highlights of 2024’s species counts and interesting and unusual sightings. To register to participate, contact him at jaturland@gmail.com or visit www.birdscanada.org/bird-science/christmas-bird-count.

The next Huron Bruce Nature Club meeting will be the annual potluck lunch and club photo contest, held Feb. 24, 2026. Doors will open at 11:30 a.m. at the Point Clark Community Centre. Guests and visitors are always welcome but should bring their own mug, dinnerware, napkin, and food to share. Inquiries can be made to Christine Roberts, christineroberts153@gmail.com.