Canada’s leading advocate for mental health awareness in agriculture, University of Guelph veterinary medicine professor Andria Jones-Bitton, is in high demand at farm meetings to speak about her ground-breaking research results. Through her studies over the past three years, she’s discovered an abnormally high rate of depression and other mental illnesses among farmers (and veterinarians).... Read More
Category: Features
You just finished a great spray day. Your timing and product choice were bang-on, the weather was good, and your sprayer was calibrated. But do you know what happened to the spray once it left the nozzle? The Spray Guys — Jason Deveau and Tom Wolf — find out in this premiere episode of Micron... Read More
Cattle markets have dropped off their highs from a few weeks ago, but they're still well ahead of where they were last year at this time. The February live cattle contract, for example, is up 28 percent in the last year. "We've had solid markets all the way around," says Anne Wasko of Gateway Livestock... Read More
A soil sensor that can detect compaction from above the ground in real-time is enabling a concept described as "variable depth tillage" for targeting compacted layers. The Topsoil Mapper made by Austria-based Geoprospectors is an example of a real-time sensor allowing farmers to account for variability as their tractor passes through a field, rather than... Read More
Claas unveiled a fierce-looking hybrid machine that it describes as the first half-track tractor with full suspension at Agritechnica 2017 in Hanover, Germany. "It's combining the best of two worlds. We have the traction efficiency with the tracks on the rear, but we have the driveability and comfort of a wheeled tractor integrated," explains Henning... Read More
Are you planning to build a new farm workshop? How big should it be? What features should you incorporate? What cool ideas would make it a ‘killer shop’? Are there pitfalls you should avoid? In episode 2 of Real Dream Workshops, Peter Johnson visits Barry and Tyler McBlain at their farm shop near Brantford in... Read More
For researchers at the University of Guelph, addressing fusarium head blight — one of wheat’s most nagging diseases — is an agronomic time trip through the geography and history of Canada. The researchers, led by Ali Navabi, have gone back to the 1880s through to the present to look at the genetic diversity of 450... Read More
Flying, biting midges (Culicoides spp.) — sometimes called no-see-ums — are a scourge to wildlife. Hunters recognize their effects on deer in particular, which are highly susceptibility to a group of midge-transmitted viruses. But there are growing concerns about their potential effect on livestock, too. Here’s why. A midge swarm will blood-feed on animals, causing... Read More
Live cattle futures have found reasons to rally since early September, even in the face of large placements in a bearish cattle on feed report last week. It's a combination of market fundamentals — profitable margins, lower carcass weights, and strong demand — driving the market out of the lows set around Labour Day, says... Read More
An all-Canadian product that promises better pork health is coming onto the domestic market this month. It’s designed to reduce antimicrobial use in piglets, by making them healthier from the start. The product is called Nuvio. Its producers, MicroSintesis and Bio Agri Mix, call Nuvio technology “proteobiotics.” That’s the name they’ve given molecules produced by... Read More