Tough conditions last fall resulted in fewer acres of wheat being planted than planned in Ontario. Some of those fields could end up defaulting back to soybeans for 2015. In this Soybean School episode, Dave Hooker, field crop agronomist and assistant professor at the University of Guelph-Ridgetown, and Bernard Tobin discuss the implications of back-to-back... Read More
Category: Crop Production
The debate over whether or not it is a good idea to have your children vaccinated is one that every person in agriculture needs to pay attention to. I use the word debate not because there is any argument — the value and safety of vaccines has been proven time and again. I would fall... Read More
How far off are we from having individual nozzle shut-off and control? We're not there yet, says Doug Prairie, with Raven, but new nozzle controls systems are improving spray precision dramatically. In this episode of TechTour, brought to you by Dow AgroSciences, Prairie sits down with Real Agriculture founder Shaun Haney to talk Raven's new... Read More
After three decades of fairly stagnant yields in Saskatchewan and Manitoba, a renewed focus on agronomic practices with flax could unlock higher yields, says a former flax breeder who now works as a research consultant for the Flax Council of Canada. “I think that flax has been undermanaged to some degree, even with fertility,” says... Read More
To underline the value of research at universities in the province, the Council of Ontario Universities has launched a campaign inviting the public to vote on what it considers to be the top 50 “game changing” research breakthroughs in the past century. Universities were asked to forward their suggestions to the council, which then chose... Read More
Rotation is generally a critical part of mitigating any disease resistance problem. When it comes to preventing the breakdown of resistance in blackleg-resistant canola varieties, the first line of defence is an extended crop rotation with non-host crops. Beyond that, growers can also rotate the canola varieties they're growing, suggests Anastasia Kubinec, oilseed specialist with... Read More
What a week! A big USDA report; end of the month; end of the quarter; shortened trading week because of the Easter holiday long weekend...if you wanted to see how markets can trade high and low, and all in the same day, this was the week. Corn and oats got the worst of it, both... Read More
The room was abuzz with the energy of high cattle prices, an informative day of sessions, and the opportunity to dress up for a night of entertainment. There was a white tablecloth, food heaped onto my plate, the offer of an array of drinks a short stroll away, and a group of quasi-strangers set to... Read More
Nobody wants to be stuck with a crop that suddenly has no market, especially when it’s due to avoidable circumstances. While Canada’s regulatory process and international trade policies are designed to prevent situations where residues from pesticides and other tools used to grow crops become trade obstacles, each farmer must still carry out their own... Read More
The value of a load of canola delivered to an elevator can vary by a few hundred dollars depending on the sieve used by the elevator to determine dockage. According to the Official Grain Grading Guide, an elevator can choose between five different slotted sieves, with slots ranging in size from 0.028 to 0.040 of... Read More