Should you stick with silage specific hybrids or include a few (or more) dual purpose lines for good measure? Both strategies can work, says Aaron Stevanus, market agronomist for PRIDE Seeds, it simply depends on your management system. Leafy, highly digestible silage-specific lines are a great choice, especially near the barn on highly fertile ground,... Read More
Category: Eastern Canada
If you’ve been on Twitter this week and happen to follow Gary Stanford (@senatrstanford), you’ll note that this newly minted president of the Grain Growers of Canada was in our nation’s capital meeting with the ag minister et al. to tackle a number of subjects that matter to Canadian farmers. Click here for all RealAgriculture’s... Read More
With over 100 years of breeding new varieties at public institutions Drs. Keith Downey (Saskatoon AAFC Research Centre) and Bryan Harvey (University of Saskatchewan) are pleased to see the recently tabled Agricultural Growth Act (Bill C-18). It enshrines a farmer’s ability to save seed for his or her own use and protects against the capture... Read More
The role of genomics continues to expand in the beef industry, with the technology becoming increasingly cost effective. Besides determining parentage, genomics have the potential to assess feed efficiency, fertility and susceptibility to disease. To many producers, this may eventually mean genetic testing most animals, most years. To others, it may simply mean genome sequencing... Read More
This year at FarmTech, one of the sessions dealt with the Harrington Seed Destructor (HSD), a machine developed in Australia to process chaff at harvest, in an attempt to destroy weed seeds. The HSD was inspired by incredible herbicide-resistance issues. This year, Canada will receive its first HSD for research purposes. Find out more from... Read More
When it comes to meat, poultry is continuing to see big demand across the country, largely because of our appetite for chicken. The Canadian Meat Council says that in 2010 the average Canadian ate almost 16 kilograms of poultry compared to 13 kg of beef and 12 kg of pork. Moving forward, poultry demand will... Read More
Could something as simple as a gate be driving down the average number of lactations per cow in your herd? Some would say, yes. Ontario field editor Bernard Tobin was on hand at this year’s Canadian Dairy Xpo at Stratford, Ont., and sat down to talk barn design, herd health and more with Joep Driessen,... Read More
In farming, we want two very opposite things from seed — we want a seed that stores well, perhaps even long term, but also a seed that, the moment conditions are right, it speedily germinates and becomes a hardy seedling. You can't always have it both ways, of course, and the inner workings of a... Read More
Its the beginning of February which means it is time for the annual National Cattleman's Beef Association (NCBA) meeting. With the cash market higher and feed prices lower than a year ago, cattle producers are seeing some strong margins and reasons for putting increased cattle on feed. Shaun Haney and Anne Wasko discuss the meeting... Read More
Without question one of the key components of a successful farm conference is the caliber of the networking opportunities available. FarmTech's great speaker lineup and face-time-heavy agenda lends itself very well to meeting new and interesting people. At this year's event, RealAgriculture's founder Shaun Haney sat down with a few attendees to discuss what brought... Read More