Without knowing the quality of the crop you have for sale, it’s difficult, if not impossible, to be successful marketing it. Knowing this critical information is a key to getting top dollar for every kernel produced on the farm. The best time to determine the grade of the crop is while it is being harvested [...]
The crop is seeded, and depending on where you are, it’s off to a great, good, or middling start. Nonetheless, at some point in the next 4 to 10+ weeks, harvest will happen. Planning for harvest has likely already started – probably even before the seeder hit the field with the crop rotation decisions and [...]
Every season some new pesticides come to market. New products can encompass label additions, new combinations of existing active ingredients or brand new active ingredients. The latter is less common than the first two. New generic products are also relatively common – which speaks to the lifespan of some of the products we are using. [...]
The goal with spraying any pesticide is to ensure the target is sufficiently covered to do the job, otherwise it can be a waste of time and resources. This year, time is especially short in some regions due to wet conditions. Targeting is straightforward when spraying early, pre-seed or pre-emergence. There’s no big crop canopy [...]
Is any growing season like another? It certainly doesn’t seem so lately. However, no matter what grower’s must contend with, a crop will go in, that’s one thing we can be sure of. “The biggest challenge for weed control in 2017 will be the crop that is still in the field,” says Clark Brenzil, provincial [...]
The goal of a good nitrogen fertilizer strategy is to get the nitrogen to the location it can be best utilized without losses. By optimizing nitrogen placement, crops can get off to a quick, even start. That, in turn, will make the pest management strategy easier and bring the crop to maturity evenly and, with [...]
2016 was not the best of seasons for Saskatchewan or Manitoba, and its impact will be felt all the way through 2017 in many ways. We all like to think if we plant the best seed with a good seed treatment, we’re doing all we can to ensure the crop gets that all-important quick, even [...]
Durum versus spring wheat – what should a grower put in his cropping plan for 2017? Is there a real choice? According to John Ippolito, regional crop specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture, there can be. It depends where you farm. “Durum is really adapted to the brown soil zone and the dryer areas of the dark [...]
What to include in the cropping plan is a bit of a puzzle every season. Proper rotation does add some constraints that have to be taken into account. Going wall-to-wall with one crop is not a feasible nor sustainable option for any grower. However, there are opportunities to push rotations a little depending on what [...]
Most of Saskatchewan is currently not at much risk of an overly wet spring. According to Mitchell Japp, provincial specialist for cereal crops at Saskatchewan Agriculture, most of the province has moderate snow cover, but is facing some warming temperatures in the next while which might impact those levels. “We went into fall with good [...]
