Les Henry

SOILS AND CROPS I had a run at this topic about three years ago but recent events suggest it should be replayed. Many recent farm press articles have outlined major changes in land tenure on the Prairies and there is great excitement about land prices. Saskatchewan has traditionally been the low price point for land […] Read more

This is the second article in a three part series covering soil mositure mechanics (January 24 issue), ground water and water tables (this issue) and stubble soil moisture (next issue). In the last column, I explained that the water table is the condition where all pore spaces in the soil are filled with water. The […] Read more

SOILS AND CROPS This article launches a series of three on the topic of soil moisture. The series includes a background investigation into soil moisture, a discussion on groundwater and water tables and finally a detailed look at existing soil moisture levels in the Prairies heading into the seeding season. Rainfall in 2010 for areas […] Read more

As the Christmas season approaches it is nice to take a break from yields, profits, grades, fertilizer, diseases and the dozens of other items that make up day to day on a modern farm. In the 70 years since I was born, there have been many changes to what makes up a family farm. Our […] Read more

Our first thought when we hear “soil” is the black topsoil we stir around (or did) with steel and diesel fuel to kill weeds and whip the soil into shape to receive seed. With the adoption of zero till we rarely see the topsoil now, but that black layer is still the concept of soil […] Read more

Soil zones and soil organic matter (OM) content are more or less synonymous on the Canadian Prairies. Parent material and climate created certain vegetation and conditions, and the combination of the two provided the organic matter of the topsoil our forefathers broke 100 years ago. A Brown soil with three inches of topsoil and 2.5 […] Read more

The editor of this magazine asked that I put together a back-to-basics-type series of articles to start the fall off right. Here’s a refresher on the basics of soil composition and some real-world examples of why it matters (see sidebars). This is the first of three articles on the topic. Next month we’ll talk about […] Read more

The decline of Environment Canada weather stations in recent years has meant much less useful rainfall and weather information for specific districts. As I make the annual soil moisture map as of freeze-up each year it is easy to get maps of total rainfall, etc., but they are made up of too few data points […] Read more

For more than 10 years there have been many studies done on Vesiculararbuscular mycorrhiza (VAM) fungi and the role they play in phosphorus availability to crops. Most of us tend to concentrate on things we know most about and soil microbiology was never my long suit. So I kind of listened at what I thought […] Read more