It’s just a blood test. Really!
We’ve all seen the “Man Van” at farm shows. I’m not sure what I thought was going on in there, but it turns out there are a crew of volunteers taking simple, five-second blood samples to find out if you (or the man next to you) have prostate cancer. I saw this up close at […] Read more
On July 24, Crops-a-palooza brought together 10 different hosting organizations, a handful of corporate sponsors, and government researchers and other volunteers. More than 200 farmers and agronomists came out to see the crops and research on display at the Canada-Manitoba Crop Diversification Centre at Carberry, Manitoba. Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada agronomist Curtis Cavers spent most […] Read more
A new face at this year’s Farm Progress Show was getting a lot of attention. Leanne Tregobov was there representing her matchmaking company, Camelot Introductions. With the decline of the Western Producer personal ads, many rural singles looking for dates have turned to the internet. Most online dating is free, and lots of farmers have […] Read more
Soil researchers provide a good look at the soil profile for farmers
On June 24, Crops-a-palooza brought together 10 different hosting organizations (see at bottom), a handful of corporate sponsors, and government researchers and other volunteers. More than 200 farmers and agronomists came out to see the crops and research on display at the Canada-Manitoba Crop Diversification Centre at Carberry, Manitoba. This show of industry cooperation was […] Read more
What exactly is “realized net farm income”?
The news app on my phone keeps bringing up more worrying headlines about agricultural trade problems that will lead to lower farm prices. Twitter is full of grim photos of durum headed out before its time and canola crops with bare patches. I won’t write here that, as of the end of June, crops in […] Read more
Count the heads, grow a uniform crop, and manage residue for best results
While we’re still changing our seeding rate approach from bushels per acre to thousand kernel weight, Phil Needham of Needham Ag Technologies, has moved on to thinking about heads per square yard. An agronomist originally from Britain and now based in Kentucky, Needham has made a name for himself advising farmers on how to increase […] Read more
Holding the May long weekend in the second half of May probably seems like a great idea for people in the city looking forward to a couple of days outside. And if the point of the weekend is to celebrate Queen Victoria’s birthday (May 24), I suppose having it at the end of May makes […] Read more
At the end of April, Farm Credit Canada (FCC) released its annual Farmland Values Report. No Grainews readers will be surprised to hear that buying land has paid off over the past decade. Canada-wide, FCC reports that farmland values increased by 6.6 per cent on average in 2018 (after increases of 8.4 per cent in […] Read more
Try a wide variety of weed control strategies
On BASF’s 2019 Herbicide Resistance Management Webinar in March, Andrew Reid, BASF technical service specialist, said it’s always easier to manage herbicide resistant weeds before you have them in your field. One way to do this is to keep things clean. “Cleanliness is key,” Reid said. For example, if you don’t clean your combine after […] Read more
“Value creation” has been a hot topic at farm meetings this season. It’s been a while since I’ve seen so many farmers so eager to get to a microphone and share an opinion. “Value creation” is one name for the idea of farmers paying more to fund Canadian wheat breeding. The meetings I’ve seen cover […] Read more
