Lees insight

Doug and Cheryl Livingstone and family have been producing grain and purebred Hereford cattle on their Vermillion, Alberta area farm for many years. But, as Doug recently noted, speaking to the Canadian Farm Writers Federation conference in Edmonton, “food doesn’t gain any real value until after it leaves the farm gate.” So the Livingstones have […] Read more

Power generating wind turbines are appearing everywhere across the country, but I bet Alberta still holds the record for having winds that can push round hay bales around. Oddly enough these pictures were sent to me by my brother-in-law, Walter, who lives in Carp, Ontario (just outside Ottawa). Supposedly they are aerial photos of hay […] Read more

After months of planning, I have now completed my H1N1 (Swine Flu) Management Strategy.  Here it is: “If I get it, I will probably feel sick for a few days until it is over.” The End.  I just hope it works. I know these may be my “famous last words’, but my alarm level over […] Read more

I know that Canada’s health care system isn’t perfect, but I think we all have a reasonable and realistic expectation that every man, woman and child, regardless of their economic status, will receive necessary medical treatment as needed. So it to some degree amazes me to see the panic in the U.S. as President Obama […] Read more

I spent part of a day recently at the Hargrave Ranch northeast of Medicine Hat,  (just north of Walsh actually, on the Alberta/Saskatchewan border) and I was duly impressed with the skill and management of James Hargraves, who is the fourth generation managing the sprawling native-prairie operation that covers a couple townships. At 26-years of […] Read more

Old farmers never die. Some may slow down, or in Ted Shipley’s case, the now-retired, long time Glenwood-Alberta area farmer, is finally realizing a long-shelved plan to turn about 100 acres of river bottom land along the Waterton River into a RV-campground and golf course.  Shipley, who is a confessed snowbird who heads for Arizona […] Read more

I sat next to a young Edmonton girl on a flight from Ottawa to Calgary recently, and she was extremely frustrated at how slow the touch-screen TV in back of the seat she faced worked. This was an Air Canada flight, every passenger had a small TV screen in the back of the seat in […] Read more

Anyone looking for a couple months of grazing for a couple hundred head of yearlings, may want to call Rodger Savory near Yorkton, Saskatchewan. Rodger is a friend of a friend, and apparently has enough pasture for two months and also has winter grazing available. That part of the country was blessed with a bit […] Read more

I shouldn’t always show disrespect for concern over global warming, but to be honest it is hard to pay it much heed, just by looking out the window. It wasn’t too long ago – early July – they were scrapping frost off the windshields near Camrose, Alberta – and that was after a cool dry […] Read more

It was interesting to note last week that as beef producers were gathered at a conference in Calgary to hear a message that the recession is coming to an end and there is great long term opportunity for the agriculture industry, hog producers were holding a rally a few blocks away to say if they […] Read more