Lavender farm gets push back from neighbours

Jim Muzyka says his new farm venture is causing his neighbours to see red where he is hoping they would see purple.
Muzyka has planted 25 acres of lavender at his farm on the 8th Concession towards Glen Huron and his plan to add an agri-tourism component has upset his neighbours, so much so that he is now scheduled to appear before the Niagara Escarpment Commission on July 15. He said he regrets having to get lawyers involved with the permit application to change the use on a shed.
Fennario Meadows, named for the fictional place in an old folk song, won’t open until next year when Muzyka hopes to welcome visitors to the farm to take in the picturesque landscape and purchase the products made from the lavender.
He said he is unfairly being compared to “Ontario’s largest lavender farm” Terre Blue in Milton, which attracts a big crowd, when Purple Hill Lavender Farm is a more accurate comparison in terms of scale, he said.
Having heard the push back from his neighbours, Muzyka said he is scaling back parking from 90 to 50 spaces and has a capacity of 300 people per day but would consider 60 per cent of that daily capacity to be a success. He said visitors would only be admitted during the bloom, from June to mid-August and a limited number of tickets would be purchased for a specific window of time.
Muzyka said he chose to plant lavender because a specialty crop was really the only viable way to make a go of a relatively small farm package in the modern farming era.
“It has been challenging but I wanted to keep it as a working farm,” he said adding that the soil quality is good, just a little hilly.
Having purchased the 100-acre farm in 2019, Muzyka said he has been restoring the old property which has been abandoned for almost two decades.
Historically known as the Arnold farm, Muzyka has cleaned up the property and is having the foundation of the dilapidated barn repaired. The plans include building a new shed that will be a replica of the Glen Huron train station that will serve as a visitors centre, store and processing facility.
There are eight varieties of lavender growing at the farm, ranging from culinary to oil heavy. He plans to wholesale and make Fennario Meadows branded products.
To appease the neighbours, Muzyka said he is maintaining a buffer at the front of the property so people won’t be tempted to stop on the road and gawk, or take selfies.
“The neighbours won’t be able to see any of it,” said Muzyka, who doesn’t reside on the property but does live down the road.
He has also been working with the Huronia Rose Society, which worked with the Arnolds, to reinstate a rose garden.
Muzyka maintains that traffic studies have indicated the road can support the traffic and once at the property, visitors won’t be a bother to the neighbourhood.
“This is not a reincarnation of an evil Canada’s Wonderland as some people are making it out to be,” said Muzyka. “This is a small and serene place that people can visit and relax while enjoying nature.”
In an attempt to make amends with neighbours, he is opening the property to anyone within walking distance on Sundays free of charge, hoping people will once again hike through the fields as they have done for many years.