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Thank a farmer, real quick Before Wednesday, I'd never crawled out of bed at 3:30 a.m. to cover an assignment. But in the wee hours of Wednesday, before the crack of dawn, I headed to Ottawa. At the invitation of Halton Federation of Agriculture member Peter Lambrick of Campbellville, I found myself crammed into a minivan at 4 a.m., en route to join a busload of more than 40 Halton and Peel farmers heading to Ottawa to make their concerns known to the federal government, more specifically Prime Minister Stephen Harper. I've covered political rallies before, but they were always on the grounds of Queen's Park in Toronto. Never in Ottawa-- this was a first. After a breakfast stop in Kingston at 7:30 a.m. we landed in the nation's capital shortly after 10 a.m. to assemble for the demonstration. Ottawa Police officers were quite accommodating with the 150 farm tractors lining four blocks of Wellington Street in front of Parliament Hill. The assembly was already underway, in spite of the fact the speeches weren't slated until 12:30 p.m. I wandered about, talked to various people from our bus and shot photos as the protesters arrived to take part. By 11:45 a.m., I climbed the steps to Parliament Hill to survey the grounds. It wasn't what I would consider a huge turnout-- in fact, it bordered on pathetic. Thoughts of the unpredictable quality of any rally shot through my mind as I sympathized with the protesters who had braved the early morning hours and long bus ride to be there. As the long hands on the Peace Tower clock approached the noon hour, I saw a sprinkling of protesters walking in, but it still wasn't outstanding. The tractors were in place, the signage was up-- where were the protesters? Another look at the clock-- 12:15, the speakers were assembling by the podium. I had taken my place beside it, so I could have a good vantage point when things happened. So far, I didn't have a lot of competition from other media. National television news teams have their permanent positions on the Hill, so the only ones are the print journalists and any wannabe shooters who wander in. I looked up again-- 12:20 p.m. Nothing much different, except I noticed across the throng of people a bunch of white placards making their way up the sidewalk to my left, at the far corner of the Hill. A cheer rang out, and everyone turned to look in that same direction. I watched, almost mesmerized as the placards. banners, flags and sandwich boards poured into the grounds. Ted Brown Thousands of men, women and children marched up the street, carrying signage, and I suddenly realized what I was seeing. The Quebec farmers had arrived. The grounds around Parliament Hill swelled to overflowing as the group's numbers rose to an estimated 10,000. At the same time as the Quebec farmers were advancing into the ground like an army, there was a smaller flow of farmers-- mostly from the West I later learned-- walking in from the other side. It was truly a meeting of east and west, Anglophone and Francophone-- and they came together, appropriately, on the grounds of Parliament Hill. When the rally started 10 minutes later, I had no doubt in my mind of its success. Prime Minister Stephen Harper would be hard pressed to ignore the force that assembled on the Hill that day. It was a huge success, organizers agreed. As a card-carrying member of the Ontario Federation of Agriculture, I have an interest in what happened on Parliament Hill Wednes-day. It's not a huge, life-altering interest for me-- my job here provides me with an alternative. But others who joined me that day don't have that safety net. Their entire being centers around the farm industry and they're suffering for the lack of programs to protect them. Canadian farmers produce the safest food in the world-- our laws demand it. But for food outside our borders, the same laws don't apply-- consumers can be buying food with pesticides, herbicides and other trace chemicals that are a threat to their health. The theme of Wednesday's protect was `Farmers Feed Cities'. It's time we pressured elected officials to implement programs to help and protect our farmers. And above all, we must buy Canadian. If you ate today, thank a farmer. But thank him real quick. Because unless there are changes made soon, there may not be too many left to thank.