Do you know your four Rs of fertility management? The 4Rs mean using the right fertilizer source, at the right rate for your soil and crop, making sure the nutrient is available in the right form at the right time. If you haven't ever heard of the 4R initiative, welcome to a new focus for... Read More
Category: Crop Production
Wheat Pete. The Wildman. Johnson. Whatever you already call Peter Johnson, you can now add "RealAgriculture agronomist" to that list. RealAgriculture and Peter Johnson are pleased to announce they have joined forces, and Peter will now take on the title of resident agronomist for the company. Already a fixture of the Wheat School, Peter recently... Read More
Now that Verticillium longisporum has been found in Canada, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency is working on getting a handle on the distribution of the new disease threat to canola. The verticillium wilt pathogen, which has caused significant economic losses in Europe’s rapeseed crop, was found in a canola trial plot at an undisclosed research... Read More
The soil beneath our feet is teeming with organisms, each with an incredibly important role in the pedosphere. Among the organisms is a group commonly referred to as earthworms (from the phylum Annelida). (video on earthworm scouting is at the end of this post) Invaders Though a few species are said to remain from the... Read More
It's looking like over a million acres of canola will be or has been reseeded in Western Canada this year, with frost in Manitoba to blame for the majority of those acres. "We're still getting a handle on how much seed actually moved into the affected areas. We know that between what the retail network... Read More
We should know better than to be surprised by the weather, but wow, some areas of the province have gone from too dry to rain, rain, rain. In some areas, reports of up to six inches of rain is causing ponding, flooding, and is delaying first planting, let alone replanting. And so, we can think... Read More
Seeding equipment manufacturer Bourgault Industries and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada say they have resolved a dispute over fertilizer placement research done over a decade ago. The disagreement revolved around the interpretation of the results of a study conducted by the Prairie Agricultural Machinery Institute, AAFC and the University of Saskatchewan from 2000 to 2002. The... Read More
Poor emergence or damping off of young soybean plants can be a sign of a seedling disease or root rot problem, especially following cool, wet weather as experienced in much of the soybean growing part of Western Canada this spring. As Holly Derksen, plant pathologist with Manitoba Agriculture, explains in this Soybean School West episode,... Read More
Ontario's government today unveiled the final version of the regulations governing the use of neonicotinoid-treated soybean and corn seeds. If you can hardly tell the difference from the proposed regulation launched late in 2014, you can be forgiven — the final regulation is only slightly tweaked from the original proposal. Ontario's Ministry of Environment of... Read More
Skipped plants in a corn row aren't always due to mechanical error or seedling blights. Early insects like wireworm or grubs can kill plants rather stealthily, leaving gaps in a row or neat leaf damage, while cutworm can clip off a patch of plants overnight. Knowing which insect causes what damage is important when assessing... Read More