Flea beetles, those tiny, hungry pests, feed on seedling leaf tissue in your canola fields almost every season. Their feeding on young canola plants causes the most economic damage. Understanding the pest and its lifecycle can help determine when control may be necessary, even if you've used a seed treatment. The two dominant species of... Read More
Category: Western Canada
I'm sitting looking at a giant white wall of snow and wind blow around my window. While I've seen far worse snow days, it's one of the colder, wetter, whiter April 15ths I've seen. Twitter was a-buzz this morning with predictions of when seeding will start for most of Western Canada. That date pushes farther... Read More
#ABbugchat will make its debut on Twitter tomorrow, Tuesday, April 16 at 10 am (11 am central). Many of us may be unfamiliar with this communication venue so perhaps it is best to do some preparation ahead. #ABbugchat will run weekly from mid-May to Mid-August. This year that means May 14 to August 13. It... Read More
Each seed treatment product protects against a specific list of diseases or insects, but it's the overall impact of early season protection on stand establishment that has much more far-reaching impacts than simply avoiding disease infection. In this Pulse School episode, Wes Anderson, agronomy manager for Richardson Pioneer, does outline which seed treatments will protect... Read More
The cool and sometimes downright cold conditions of spring can really throw a wrench in the seeding schedule. The seed treater isn't immune to the cold either, and working in less than ideal conditions takes a bit of a different approach. There's also general maintenance and calibration that should be done every year. In this... Read More
DuPont announced today that Canada's Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) has granted approval for the registration of Lumiderm insecticide seed treatment. DuPont Lumiderm insecticide is a new seed treatment product for canola growers containing the active ingredient cyantraniliprole, a Group 28, anthranilic diamide insecticide that provides early season control of flea beetles, both striped and... Read More
This week Agrium shareholders elected its slate of directors hopefully putting to rest a brutal distracting 10 month proxy battle with corporation predator JANA Partners LLC. This has been a long slug fest that quickly got personal as JANA became more and more aggressive in its quest to break up Agrium to attempt to maximize... Read More
Timing a spring tillage operation can be particularly challenging when the weather decides to be rather uncooperative for a timely planting season. And while cool or wet conditions can have you stressed out about the need to get on the field, heading out too soon on wet soil can have season-long negative effects. As Jim... Read More
Food and farming wise, I like what’s going on in agriculturally rich Waterloo region, where people have rallied to create the region’s first food charter. It was accepted by the regional council's community services committee there Monday. The charter's sponsor, the Waterloo Region Food System Roundtable, calls the five-point document “a statement of values and... Read More
Sclerotinia gets so much attention, you'd think it was the only disease canola succumbed to. While there are many reasons to brush up on sclerotinia management, doing so at the expense of watching and managing for blackleg is a recipe for a slow-building disaster. While canola varieties do have resistance to several strains of the... Read More