Natural Themes is a part of a family market gardening cooperative, Cold Creek Valley Growers. You can find our naturally grown produce at the Front Street Farmers’ Market in Trenton every Saturday from May 18 until the Thanksgiving weekend in October.
Cold Creek Valley Growers offers fruits and vegetables as they come into season between March and end of December. Our produce is organically grown in our fields, gardens and cold frame greenhouses where we strive to support natural balance as much as possible.
The Heissler family beginnings were in war-torn Europe. After emigrating to Canada from Germany in 1952, Maria and Paul Heissler set their sights on finding a farm on which to put down roots in their new country. Within a year, they found the farm that reminded Paul of his beloved Estonia. It was beautiful in its ruggedness with rolling hills, woodlands, wetlands, and meadows along the Cold Creek near Stockdale. The stones that littered most of the fields made it difficult to farm, but Paul and Maria saw potential. In August 1953, they got a mortgage to purchase the farm on what is now Maybee Road and moved there with their family.
The first years were especially difficult. While Paul continued to work in Toronto to pay the bills, Maria put in a small garden to feed the family. To help make ends meet, she took extra produce to the Trenton Farmer’s Market.

Cold Creek Farm soon became well-known for the vegetables and fruit that went to market every Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday during the growing season.
As they were growing up, the Heissler children were heavily involved in the market gardening operation. Though they each went their separate ways to pursue their own interests and careers, five of the children along with their families eventually came back to the original farm with their own ventures:
· The Garden Network
· Natural Themes Native Plant Nursery
· Heissler Greenhouses Inc.
· Down-to-Earth Creations
· 100 Acre Wood
Out of this family connection came the idea of co-operative market gardening under the name Cold Creek Valley Growers. Members grow and market plants, fruits and vegetables on the land that sustained them in their youth. They are joined by older brother, Ivar, who organically produces fruits and vegetables at his farm, Lost Road Gardens, north of Stirling. Produce is sold weekly at the Front Street Farmers’ Market in Trenton.
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