Teaching by day, farming by summer: Norfolk County, Russel Blake, and black currants

Russel Blake holds a jar of his blackcurrant jam at his Norfolk County farm, where he has grown currants for over two decades.

By Leah Bauer

Some things just don’t seem like they would go well together, such as black currants and Norfolk County’s sandy loam soil, or school teachers and farming. However, for Vittoria’s Russel Blake, those four things have combined along with many learning experiences, and a constant willingness to evolve to formulate his career over the last 25 years.

Blake grew up on a farm outside of Simcoe that has been in his family since the 1840s. Therefore, farming had always been an integral part of his life. So, when he and his wife moved into a farm home with seven acres of farm land he knew that he wanted to follow in his family’s tradition and cultivate that land.

“We found this little farm in Vittoria that had an old farmhouse on it,” Blake said, “The farm and the farmhouse were pretty rough when we first moved, but I knew that I wanted to farm on that land.”

There was one minor issue that stood in the way of Blake’s dream of farming the land that surrounded his house; he was a schoolteacher at Walsh Public Elementary School.

“I knew I wanted to do something with farming, but because I was a teacher, it had to be busy in July and August,” Blake remarked.

Blake did not give up and simply rent his viable land out to nearby farmers. Instead, he chose to focus on finding a crop that he could plant, harvest, and sell in the July-August season. Blake knew that his options were either sour cherries or black currants.

“My options were sour cherries, which required a high investment, or black currants which were more obscure,” Blake pointed out. “We chose black currants, they kept me really busy in the summer, and then died out by September so that I could go back to teaching.”

Black currants are native to Northern Europe and Northern Asia, and are highly popular in Northern and Eastern Europe as well as in Great Britain. In Southern Ontario, including here in Norfolk County, they might not be as well known, or as widely produced, but that hasn’t stopped Blake from amassing many returning customers who come back year after year for his buckets of frozen berries, cordials and jams.

While black currants are native to Northern Europe and Asia, the shrub is also able to thrive in Ontario. The shrubs are strong enough to withstand cooler climates, managing to last from 8-10 years even through brutal Canadian winters. The soil in Norfolk is mainly sandy loam, which has less moisture retention than other soils, so Blake uses trickle irrigation to maintain his black currants.

Any farmer, no matter the size of the operation, who has had a career in farming as long as Blake’s knows how pesticide use has evolved. Today, Blake relies on ground up fertilizers and soil amendments to support plant health and resilience in his black currants, rather than relying solely on chemical controls. Looking back, he finds it striking how products that were once standard practice early in his career are now completely illegal in 2026.

The use of pesticide isn’t the only element that has evolved over the course of Blake’s career. Fluctuations in the weather, specifically the very hot and dry portions of last summer affected his yearly routine. It is normal for Blake to have his black currants ready a few weeks earlier than farms located farther north, though last year proved to be a bit of a curveball for farmers in Ontario, and Blake and his black currants were no exception.

“But last summer it was 33, 35 degrees, and it went on for weeks. The black currants were green and the next day they just seemed to be black and falling off, and just the speed of harvest was incredible,” Blake remarked. “I’m going to put that down as one funny year. I was watering them. I did everything as normal, but it was just so hot.”

Weather fluctuations aside, the last few years have been different for Blake as he retired from teaching and has had more time to attend markets in Ancaster and Burlington. While meeting a farmer is a daily occurrence in Norfolk County, in the city it is not the same story.

“When people come into the markets, it is always a surprising thing for them when they find out that I grow it as well. ‘Oh, you’re the farmer.’ Well, yeah, I do the whole operation,” Blake noted. “So, when I go to the city and do markets there, it’s huge the fact that I’m the grower and the producer.”

Blake doesn’t stop at pails of frozen black currants, as tasty as they might be, he has also worked to create a few signature black currant products. One of his signature products is black currant cordial, which he says works great in a black currant mojito cocktail. The second is a delicious black currant jam. Blake has experimented with some other black currant products such as wine, and black currant creme de cassis. In the years following his retirement, he has been working to start beekeeping on his acres and plans to begin growing and producing fresh-cut flowers.

Blake’s farm is a small operation, which is a bit of a juxtaposition considering that the Vittoria Scotlynn office is essentially in his back yard. He appreciates the fact that his operation stayed small.

“I know exactly what’s going on all the time, because I’m the one doing everything,” he remarked.

His small-scale black currant farm allowed him to maintain a career as a schoolteacher while staying occupied and active during his off months. Not to mention the fact that having a small-scale operation has allowed him to have complete control over what he does, what he doesn’t do, and everything that falls in between. Farms like Blake’s are an essential piece to the larger puzzle that is Norfolk’s farming community. 