It's early April and farmers are itching to get the planter out in the field. For the precious few of you in Ontario that are nearly ready to roll, have at 'er, but for most of the corn growing region, it's not late yet, but it's looking like the planting window may be slightly compressed.... Read More
Category: Eastern Canada
Despite efforts to explain pesticides’ role in modern agriculture, confusion still reigns supreme in the eyes of the public. And no wonder. Pesticides get blamed for a lot of things; most recently, for wiping out bees. That accusation caught the Province of Ontario's attention last summer and fall, when wildly fluctuating accounts of bee mortality... Read More
Apps continue to grow and evolve in all aspects of agriculture, with crop commodities eons ahead of their livestock counterparts. Discussions are no longer bound by the confines of a physical community, with information being shared on Twitter, Google+ (check out #cattle and the Cattle Community for a taste of each), Facebook, Instagram and others.... Read More
UAP’s new Focus herbicide is now registered for soybeans. The surface-applied pre-plant/pre-emerge product was first registered for corn in late 2013. Focus is a co-pack of carfentrazone (Group 14) and pyroxasulfone (Group 15) that delivers up to 60 days of residual control, says UAP territory sales representative Chris Renwick. Focus controls tough weeds like barnyard... Read More
We're in the thick of calving season, and if the sight of healthy new calves frolicking doesn't put a smile on your face, calf prices will. Year-over-year calf prices are rosy indeed, and the price improvements move all the way from calves, to cows, cow/calf pairs and on into the cull cow market. In this... Read More
From the very simple, to the GPS-reference, cloud-shared, multi-user type, the number of made-for-agriculture apps grows each month. If you've got a current smartphone or tablet, you're set to begin incorporating these handy time savers and data-management tools into your farm. If you're somewhat overwhelmed by the technology, fear not. Some apps are really just... Read More
A number of years ago, one of the first farm meetings I attended as a young radio reporter on the agriculture beat had a speaker talking on a subject that few farmers had considered. It was on what role activism would play in food production down the road, and how farmers could react. At the... Read More
Whether you've recently purchased a planter, or you're bringing it out of hibernation, making sure it's in good working order is essential to good establishment. Besides greasing, checking hydraulic hoses and vacuuming mouse-made nests, you should also check that the planter is running level, and with the correct amount of down pressure. Related: The Pros... Read More
If you cannot see the embedded player, please click here to hear this audio. As we ended the month of March and shovelled our way through “spring” weather in to April, the grain markets were hit with a fairly uneventful Stocks and Acreage report from the USDA. The biggest shock came in the form of... Read More
As the snow finally melts in Ontario, cash crop farmers have a lot to do in a short window. There's still plenty of corn out there and lots of unfinished tillage work. In this episode of the Ontario Agronomy Geeks podcast, Bernard Tobin talks strategy with agronomist Mervyn Erb of Agri-Solve Inc. — what should... Read More