Over four years ago during the pause in life caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Alberta farmer and former CWB director Ken Motiuk thought it a good time to start researching a book recounting the decades-long fight by many farmers like himself and other grain industry players to win the freedom of choice in how to market their grain.

That effort resulted this spring in the publication of a treatise by Motiuk titled Culture of Control: Farming with the Shackles of the Canadian Wheat Board. If you like agriculture and history and ever wondered about the rise and fall of the CWB era, the 330-page book is a good read.

This isn’t just the rainy-day musings of a 70-something, third-generation farmer from the northeastern Alberta farming community of Mundare. It is a well-researched, well-written, well-documented, easy-to-read recounting, albeit from a “reformer’s” viewpoint, of how the CWB came to be and served a useful role in grain marketing in 1936; how some 35 years later the power of the agency had weakened the western Canadian grain handling and marketing system; and how it took another 35 or more years of protesting, lobbying and political wheeling and dealing to finally free the industry from the marketing monopoly.

Motiuk opens the book with a look at growing up on a mixed farm in Alberta in the 1960s and ’70s, recognizing then that the control, policies and programs of the CWB had created a “mess.”

“The problem was too much regulation, too many regulatory bodies with overlapping jurisdiction controlling the system, lack of market signals to farms and a disinterest from railways in hauling grain because they were losing money on every bushel they shipped,” he writes.

“This monopolistic structure was supported by self-serving farm organizations led by the Prairie wheat pools, who continually planted fear and uncertainty in the minds of farmers that any change to a market-driven system would be to the demise of their finances and the Prairie farm economy.”

Motiuk walks the reader through the evolution of western Canadian farming from the beginning of the 20th century and introduction of the first short-lived wheat board during the First World War. As the Prairie pools were established, they banded to create the Central Selling Agency (CSA), a system which failed during the Great Depression. The federal government bought all the CSA grain inventory with the pools lobbying the federal government to create a compulsory wheat board. The new CWB was formed in 1936.

Motiuk got to experience that Prairie grain handling and marketing structure from several different angles. He was a quasi-political creature, working for many years as a special assistant to Vegreville MP Don Mazankowski. “Maz” served in a number of roles including federal transportation minister. In the early days Motiuk worked for Alberta Agriculture’s statistics branch. He also served on the federal Farm Debt Review Board and the Senior Grain Transportation Committee, was a public governor on the Winnipeg Commodity Exchange, and was involved with commodity organizations such as the Western Canadian Wheat Growers. Eventually he was elected a director of United Grain Growers (UGG). Somewhere in all that activity, he and wife Wendy also in the early 1990s were named Canada’s Outstanding Young Famers.

Motiuk describes the Prairie pools and UGG as grain handling entities with widely different philosophies. They both had all or partially farmer-elected boards, “but the pools attracted farmer-directors with a socialist mindset that called for government intervention and CWB control,” he writes. “UGG tended to elect farmer-directors who believed in market-based solutions with more freedom for farmers to make their own decisions.” While he liked the UGG philosophy, his time as a director to his dismay eventually fell victim to UGG internal politics.

The end of the Western Grain Transportation Agency and the payment of the Crow benefit to railways in 1996 sparked a movement toward consolidation within the Prairie grain handling companies. With federal Liberal governments in power, the CWB was well entrenched. The Mulroney government was cautious about rocking the CWB boat too much, but in 1989 Charlie Mayer, as minister responsible for the CWB, did manage to get oats removed from CWB jurisdiction. With Stephen Harper’s Conservative government elected in 2006, the tide began to turn.

On the 15-member CWB were both government-appointed and farmer-elected directors. Motiuk was appointed to the board by the Harper government in 2006, and during elections James Chatenay of Alberta and Dwayne Anderson of Saskatchewan were also elected. They were among the first “reformers” to sit on the CWB board. They didn’t have much influence against the majority of directors but served as a burr under the CWB status quo saddle … it was a start.

In these chapters Motiuk takes the reader behind the scenes of the CWB operations. At his first meeting for example, he was appointed to serve on the audit committee and governance and management resources committee. “I was walking into a situation where my beliefs were directly opposed to the majority in the room,” he writes. It wasn’t the most pleasant environment, as he notes there was even a very rigid seating hierarchy and “many of the board members lacked social decorum, business acumen and financial knowledge. This meeting was a real gong show. The CWB was run by a group of financial neanderthals. Their main interest was mindlessly supporting and promoting the CWB without question.”

That was 2006. It wasn’t until 2011 when the Harper government won a majority and then-agriculture minister Gerry Ritz introduced the Marketing Freedom for Grain Farmers Act — the act that spelled the end of the CWB monopoly. Through the chapters Motiuk “pulls back the curtain” to describe, from his front-row seat, the people, places, events and attitudes that prevailed through those changing times.

Motiuk notes despite decades of fearmongering claiming the loss of the CWB would be the end of Prairie agriculture, it soon became clear that “No, Chicken Little, the sky did not fall,” as the single-desk agency passed into history.

In the closing pages, Motiuk has a thoughtful look at the future of the family farm, noting the impact of climate change and politics surrounding the environment can’t be ignored.

The book is well done with lots of photos and illustrations. Although I wasn’t a farmer, I was an observer of the Prairie agriculture industry for more than 35 years, so the mentions of people and events from the ’80s, ’90s, and ’00s make for a great walk down memory lane.

Culture of Control, published by Friesen Press out of Manitoba, will be available in June. You can buy from the publisher or directly from Motiuk via email ($30 plus $18 mailing), or from selected stores or online booksellers. The price will vary with who’s selling (and shipping), but it’s going to be in that $40-$60 range.

If you consider the cost of the book is about the same as six or seven bushels of wheat at 2025 prices, note that thanks to the events described in that book you do have the freedom today to handle your own marketing; in many respects, that is pretty good value.

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The SLA created OBOP in 2017, aiming to generate a provincewide conversation based on a single book at the same time as supporting literacy and creating a reading culture, raising the profile of libraries and literacy organizations, and building community. Food is an ideal medium to meet these goals, and two of the previous eight OBOP honourees are wonderful food books: Amy Jo Ehman’s Out of Old Saskatchewan Kitchens (2018), and the late Habeeb Salloum’s Arab Cooking on a Prairie Homestead (2022). My book Bread & Water is a culinary memoir about my return to Saskatchewan in 2010, woven through with meditations on cooking, grief and loss, aging, flood and place, the politics and issues of local and sustainable food, and sexism in the restaurant world.

April is a great time for a kitchen party. On the Prairies, the month is a hopeful time for food lovers: we’re perusing seed catalogues, planning our gardens and dreaming about salads made from the season’s first greens. We know that our winter plainsong chant of cabbage and carrots and rutabagas and beets and the winter’s last spuds will soon be replaced by the tonic notes of the first rhubarb, the grassy high notes of the first asparagus, the snare drum rattle and roll of crunchy first peas. And of course food remains a doubly hot topic as our nation keeps our collective elbows up in the face of trade tariffs.

Tins of handmade cookies will make the trip with me. As regular readers know, cookies are high on my list of gifts to make and share, and I’ve rummaged through some of my favourite recipes for ideas on what to bake for this road trip.

Cookies are deceptively simple bits of baking. Being made of very few ingredients, they rely not only on the best ingredients but careful attention to detail and technique. They are often the first thing that child bakers attempt, because how complicated can they be, right? Regardless of whose hands do the mixing and shaping, cookies made with good will and attention are community builders of the highest order, and I’m pleased to share mine with you. First we eat, then we turn our attention to matters of trade.

Apricot and almond stars

These rich cookies are fragile and a wee bit fussy, but immensely delicious and beautiful, ideal for a mid-afternoon cuppa with your bestie. They are proof positive that handmade cookies far outstrip anything you can buy in a grocery store, and are worth the time they take to make.

Makes about 30 cookies.

• ½ cup unsalted butter
• 1/3 cup white sugar
• ½ tsp. almond extract
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• ½ tsp. baking powder
• A pinch of salt
• 1 egg white or whole egg
• 1 Tbsp. milk or cream
• 1/3 cup apricot jam
• ¼ c. sliced almonds, optional
• Set the oven at 375 F. Line several baking sheets with parchment.

Cream butter on high speed for a minute. Add sugar and almond extract, and cream until light and fluffy, 5 minutes. Add egg yolk and mix well. Sift together dry ingredients, and blend into the mixture.

Whisk the egg white or whole egg with cream until homogeneous, then set aside.

Dust the counter with flour and roll out the dough to a thickness of 1/4-inch or slightly thinner. Cut into 2-inch squares. Use a metal lifter to place each square on baking sheet. Use a small knife to slice each corner diagonally, leaving a ½-inch centre unsliced. Spoon a bit of jam into the centre. Fold every other point into the centre, forming a star. Gently brush exposed cookie dough with egg wash and sprinkle with optional almonds. Bake until golden brown, about 7-10 minutes. Cool before moving from the tray.

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From 2000 onward, Alberta Agriculture severely cut down on this and other farm information units. The books and fact sheets are fully relevant today but they need upgrading and maintenance, in a few instances, so they can remain available and useful to the farming industry.

Take for example the Alberta Blue Book, also known as the Alberta Crop Protection Guide. This book was developed in the 1980s as a comprehensive guide to available herbicides, fungicides and insecticides. I was responsible for the fungicide and seed treatment section. The Blue Book was a roaring success and soon there was a joint Manitoba/Saskatchewan version, now produced as separate entities.

Despite that success, Alberta Agriculture dropped its annual production. Fortunately, it was promptly taken over by Alberta’s crop commissions and you can purchase a copy online for around $15. The Saskatchewan edition, the Guide to Crop Protection, is available for free at agricultural extension offices and farm gatherings. The updated 2024 text can be obtained by calling 1-866-457-2377 in Saskatchewan.

The Manitoba version, the Guide to Field Crop Production, is available at provincial ag service centres at $10 per copy.

All three publications are updated annually and are excellent texts to have on hand. It is easier to pick up any of these and look up the pesticide you may have applied during the current growing season or the previous year.

The more you know

I could list dozens of textbooks, let alone fact sheets, but I will list and describe only a few. In the mid-1970s, none of these farmer information textbooks existed and weed, disease and insect control were virtually matters of word of mouth.

In 1975, I was looking at an information sheet on sclerotinia in canola and to my surprise, it said sclerotinia infection was a result of broken pieces of fungal hyphae bounced up from the soil surface by rainstorms. The first canola field I visited was heavily damaged by sclerotinia in late July 1975 at Stony Plain, Alta. Within a few steps into the diseased crop, there were dozens of tiny fungal apothecia (mushrooms) in every square foot or so of cropland.

It seems no one in North America had bothered to look for overwintered sclerotes in the field. This Stony Plain field had dozens of visitors from many areas of the Prairies who finally began to better understand this destructive disease.

As a consequence of this and other field crop diseases in Canada, I linked up with Lloyd Edgington at the University of Guelph and Lloyd Seaman at Ottawa. We agreed at a meeting of the Canadian Phytopathological Society to compile a textbook in English and French on significant diseases of field crops in Canada.

By 1984, under the editorship of Lloyd Seaman, W.J. Martins and T.G Atkinson, co-operation from coast to coast produced our 160-page colour illustrated text, Diseases of Field Crops in Canada. Sales in the $30 range were brisk on the Prairies, outstripping the rest of the country combined.

This book has been revised twice, with a third edition on the way. Much of the financing for the third edition came from the agrochemical and seed technology industries. Copies can be obtained from Discovery Seed Labs in Saskatoon at 306-249-4484 at $35 each.

If you are into horticulture or potatoes, you need to look up Diseases and Pests of Vegetable Crops in Canada. The chief editor was Ron Howard at Alberta Agriculture at Brooks. Howard and many others did a fantastic job of describing the significant pests and diseases of horticultural crops from coast to coast. This book is a free download on the internet and is an absolute must for potato growers as well as those of every horticultural crop.

There are many books, booklets and fact sheets available to growers on the internet. Just because you can install an app on your phone, do not think you have all the answers on hand. If, for example, you are an organic grower, Alberta Agriculture published a book called Practical Crop Protection on weeds, insects and disease. The 170-page text is non-chemical and though it was published in 1993, it warned against the damages of clubroot in canola well before its discovery in 2003.

Such books and fact sheets may vanish with the onset of technology, but having them on hand or revising their content and keeping them current online for the farming community could help ward off insect, weed or disease problems before they become endemic.

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Henry has been a well-known figure in public meetings and extension over the years and is no stranger to challenging presenters regularly. His boots-on-the-ground, common-sense approach to the soil sciences is one to which farmers relate. Henry’s Handbook features many practical notes and general rules, with the overall intention to challenge keen minds and provide ‘eureka’ moments, connecting textbook science to real-life examples.

“When I started my degree in 1992, I really enjoyed the introductory soil science classes and labs and Les was a big reason for that,” Willness says.

Whether in class, doing an extension meeting, or authoring, Henry was always challenging his audience on how they think about soil and water. A staple on many agronomists’ bookshelves, Henry’s Handbook lists the five soil-forming factors, defined as ‘climate, vegetation, parent material, topography and time.’ Henry provokes the reader to think further about soil by stating that the five main factors are ‘water, water, water, water and water.’ Henry has been quoted many times throughout the years with the common philosophy that ‘water drives everything.’ The book is a valuable resource covering concepts from the simple, such as the three phases of soil, to the more complex, such as hydrology and groundwater chemistry.

“I am happy to have the opportunity to transfer copyright for Henry’s Handbook of Soil and Water,” Henry says. “I know Cory and his company will do a good job in carrying on the legacy of my handbook.”

Willness says he and Henry have a mutual passion for the interactions between soil properties, water relationships, and soil surveys — an interest that helped form the vision for SWAT Maps and Croptimistic’s position in precision agriculture.

“Les and I have conversed on many phone calls, emails and meetings in his home office on Tucker Crescent in Saskatoon where our photo was taken,” Willness says.

In 2017, Henry signed Willness’ copy of the Handbook, writing “With fond memories of many useful discussions about soils, fertilizers and particularly precision ag.”

As they shook on the copyright exchange and future Handbook sales plans in April 2024, Henry updated his signing to “Here’s to good luck as a book salesman.”

Henry’s Handbook can now be purchased online. A new episode of the SWAT Agronomy podcast (episode SWAT 018) featuring Les Henry is now available through Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts.

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These fine books reflect our talented community of cooks. I led the way out of the locavore gate with my 1992 locavore restaurant, Foodsmith, and 20 years later, Foodshed: An Edible Alberta Alphabet.

Kudos also to former Grainews columnist Amy Jo Ehman, author of two seminal locavore food books, Out of Old Saskatchewan Kitchens and Prairie Feast: A Writer’s Journey Home for Dinner.

Nod to Prairie traditions

The oeuvre continues to expand with the release of Prairie: Seasonal, Farm-Fresh Recipes Celebrating the Canadian Prairies, by Dan Clapson and Twyla Campbell. The book’s seasonal recipes lead with summer’s largesse and conclude with a short section of staples and an even shorter list of provincially organized sources.

The authors’ nod to Prairie traditions like freezing, drying, cellaring and preserving pays tribute to farmers and reminds us that local eating keeps money in the community. They also offer tips on managing waste and utilizing scraps and leftovers, even more timely as food prices continue to soar.

Clapson and Campbell called on chefs who participated in their annual Prairie Grid itinerant dinner series, among them Saskatchewan chefs Jenni Lessard and Christie Peters, and contributed their own updated takes on Prairie fare. Prairie is handsome, with full-page colour photographs by Dong Kim for every recipe and beverage.

Clapson repeatedly fesses up to his pickle mania (with the exception of bread and butter pickles!), using pickle brine to good advantage in leek soup, gribiche and marinades, but the book offers few actual pickle recipes.

To broaden your aperitivo range, try local-first bevvies like “Watermelon Sugar” — named after crooner Harry Styles — with Thai basil, gin and amaro, a bitter Italian herbal digestif-style liqueur made by several Canadian distillers. In Saskatchewan, use Lucky Bastard Gambit Gin, but Albertans might prefer Campbell’s suggestion of Anohka’s Tempest Dry Gin.

Notable dishes worth investigating include stovetop tomato confit; soufflé pancakes laced with coffee and rye whisky; tea-infused crème anglaise, or stirred custard, with roasted fruit; charred cabbage with Béarnaise sauce; beautiful beet-filled mezzaluna, or ravioli, from Peters and a dense mushroom tourtière that surely won’t miss the absence of pork. Among the spare collection of desserts is a standout winter chocolate layer cake with a layer of sugared nuts.

“We’re not fussy, so we’ve kept this pretty simple,” they write. True that. The origins of the stylish dishes cut a swath as wide as a combine’s, from Ukrainian classics like borscht re-imagined to Calgary chef Jinhee Lee’s kimchee.

Each dish is simple in execution, but in presentation the dishes lean upscale, which is no surprise as the authors are restaurant reviewers. Clapson’s back-of-book acknowledgements include a shout-out to his friends who “often have to remind me that life isn’t solely about cooking ‘gourmand’ or dining out at ‘cool’ restaurants.”

Prairie encourages us to put on our fancy pants, set the table with Granny’s favourite Medalta stoneware or Depression glass, and grab our aprons. First we eat, then we swap stories about our granny’s favourite pickles.

Cowboy Country Spice Blend

This robust blend has lamb, beef or bison writ large over its flavour profile. Start with a Moroccan-inspired blend called ras el hanout, which means “head of shop.” In a pinch, you could substitute an Indian garam masala or curry blend. Makes 1/2 cup.

• 2 tablespoons ground espresso or dark roast coffee beans
• 2 tablespoons ras el hanout
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 4 teaspoons kosher salt

Mix well and store in airtight containers.

Prairie Grid Spice Blend

This seasoning blend originates with Scott Redekopp, executive sous chef at Calgary’s Hotel Arts, who calls it an alternative to Montreal steak spice, good on meats, salads and roasted vegetables.
As with any blend, it makes allowance for temperament and taste, as well as availability. For instance, in the absence of rosehips and smoked salt, I used dried rose petals and smoked paprika, used whole cloves in place of ground and omitted the Sichuan peppercorns because I don’t like their mouth-numbing quality. Starting with whole spices always yields best flavours. Makes 2 cups.

• 2 tablespoons dried rosehips
• 2 tablespoons fennel seed
• 2 tablespoons Sichuan peppercorns
• 2 tablespoons coriander seed
• 2 tablespoons cumin seed
• 3 whole star anise
• 7 tablespoons white sugar
• 2 tablespoons dried minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons onion powder
• 2 tablespoons ground ginger
• 1 tablespoon ground cloves

Dry roast the first six ingredients in a small pan over medium-high heat for two to three minutes, stirring periodically. Transfer to a spice mill and grind finely. Mix in the remaining ingredients and divide into several airtight containers. Keeps for several months in a cool dry space.

The post New Canadiana Cookbooks: Prairie appeared first on Grainews.

First, I take my elderly Momsy to our favourite dim sum palace, where we eat many types of Chinese dumplings. Then I take myself into my kitchen and make some dumplings to share.

We all love dumplings. They show up in wonderful variety around the planet, composed of a filling encased in a dough wrapper of some consistency or other, although the presence of a wrapper is arguable.

Their names also change. My Hutterite grandmother’s Russian-Ukrainian vareniki dumplings, for instance, are similar to Polish pierogi.

In What We Talk About When We Talk About Dumplings, editor John Lorinc describes dumplings in all their varied global glory as “intergenerational time travellers … accompanying us or our ancestors through immigration, exodus, enslavement, commerce, and conquest, like so much culinary-carry-on … [with] nothing as definitive as a recipe … in defiance of our era’s obsession with lovely cookbooks and five-star online recipes.”

The collection’s essays and recipes by an assortment of Canadian literati bear out Lorinc’s assertions.

Among them are existential ravioli by Kristen Arnett and David Buchbinder’s exploration of matzo balls, the wrapper-less dumpling made from unleavened flatbread. Buchbinder insists that because Passover is a celebration of freedom, the matzo ball integral to the accompanying Seder meal should be light and fluffy, best in soup redolent of herbs, fat and long-simmered bone broth.

Trinidadian-born Giller-Prize-winning novelist André Alexis recalls his childhood dumplings made of flour and cornmeal, “solid, glutinous and toothsome … somewhere between solid and airy, the culinary equivalent of a colloid,” like himself as an immigrant, neither of here nor of there, “half this, half that.”

Julie van Rosendaal composes an ode to perogy bees as “the social media of generations past,” and Miles Morrisseau muses on his Metis mother’s duck dumpling soup.

Lorinc recalls the trials of mastering szilvás gombóc, or Hungarian plum dumplings, with his sister and his son after his mother could no longer make the traditional autumn dish.

In Eric Geringas’s 1990 trip to Prague after the fall of the Iron Curtain, he meets a bread dumpling called knedlik. While there, he falls in love with Czech “black humour, the winking anti-authoritarianism … a culture of survival, of learning to thrive even when power is in someone else’s hands.” The ubiquitous knedlik serves as a “middle finger to pomposity,” just as dumplings made of humble ingredients are everyday food around the world.

Sylvia Putz’s essay puts me in the centre of a Korean dumpling-making party of women, and it’s time to cook. A dumpling by any other name. First we eat, then we argue taxonomy.

Potstickers

This potsticker filling is good in half-moon jiaozi and open-top siu mai. They’re usually served steamed, but I fry and then steam them for crispy flat bottoms. Makes about 80. 

• 1 large bunch chard
• 1 onion, finely minced
• 1 large carrot, grated
• 1 head garlic, minced
• 1/4 cup grated ginger root
• 2 pounds ground raw turkey, chicken, pork or a blend
• 1 pound chopped raw shrimp
• 1/4 cup each minced cilantro, chives, spearmint and basil
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1/4 cup fish sauce
• Hot chili paste to taste
• 2 eggs
• 2 packages won ton wrappers
• Oil for sautéing 

Serve with this vinegar-chili dip: 

• 1/2 cup black or rice vinegar
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon roasted sesame oil 

Cut off the chard stalks, mince them and steam in a large shallow pan. Chop the chard leaves and add. When wilted, remove from heat, drain and pat dry. 

Combine remaining ingredients with the chard, excluding the won ton wrappers and oil. Mix thoroughly. 

Trim corners off square wonton wrappers to make them round. Cover stack of wrappers with plastic to keep them from drying out. (Fry corner trimmings for a terrific salad garnish!) 

Put one wrapper on the palm of your hand and add a spoonful of filling. Fold wrapper up from bottom to cover filling and create a short cylinder with an exposed top. Place on a tray dusted with cornstarch. Repeat. Freeze in a single layer, and transfer into freezer bags once solid. 

To cook, remove potstickers from freezer and heat a sauté pan on moderately high heat. Add enough oil to lubricate pan. Add potstickers in a single layer. Sauté until well browned (check by picking up one and inspecting the underside). 

Add a half-inch of water. Cover snugly and cook until water evaporates and the dumplings are cooked through, about seven minutes. Immediately use a metal spatula to free potstickers from pan before they stick. Clean pan before cooking next batch. 

Combine in several individual ramekins.

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The next step often involves a trip online to Ottawa to visit CanSIS (Canadian Soil Information Service). That site has all the current and historic soil survey reports for all of Canada — a very valuable resource. So, here we go, to see some actual examples. I am giving the locations but not the names because I have not sought permission to mention names.

Rollo Bay West, P.E.I.

This was a great thrill and a first for that far east; Rollo Bay is just 20 miles west of the eastern tip of Prince Edward Island. A drive down the highway brought just what you would think — a field of potatoes with very red soil, just like I saw in Tanzania all those years ago.

The soil survey map for Kings County showed the Rollo Bay area to be like Charlottetown, fine sandy loam with good drainage but strongly acidic. The soil survey report acknowledged the help of J.S. (Pete) Clark, who recruited me in 1972 for the two-year stint on the slopes of Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and Walter Burns, who was the Canadian director of that project. Small world.

Brucefield, Ont.

Brucefield is 10 miles east of the east shore of Lake Huron and is 270 feet higher than the lake, so there is a good drainage gradient.

The reader who ordered a book is a private agronomist and we established email contact. I had checked out the soil survey report, but he gave me good additional information. I suspected the soils to be acidic because of high rainfall amounts — but not so. They are glacial soils derived from limestone, so pH is neutral to a bit high in places. The big issue is drainage, and tile drainage is the norm. The original tile spacing was 45 feet, but some are splitting that to 22 feet, and the spacing on new installations is 27 feet.

Bruderheim, Alta.

The reader at Bruderheim, Alta., was on a road with an address, so Google Earth could drop me down to do a drive-by. There is a beautiful farmyard with mature shelterbelt on three sides and bins galore with a well-developed grain handling system.

I knew the soils from a former colleague (famous soil microbiologist Eldor Paul), who was raised on a dairy farm near Bruderheim. He was raised on very productive, thick black soils with deep topsoil.

Bonus Round: Wes Anderson Croppro Consulting

When I did a search for Bruderheim on the computer, it spit out an email from Wes Anderson, who had read and responded to an earlier column on soil pH. He has done work on very sandy soils north of Bruderheim, just south of the North Saskatchewan River. He found many pH values in the 5.0-5.6 range and some as low as 4.8 and 4.9.

CropPro does the SWAT system of zoning fields for variable rate, etc. In some fields, the pH ranges from 5.4-7.8, so targeted liming would be a possibility, but some fields were very acidic throughout.

Wes sent me several good photos of canola with severe calcium and magnesium deficiency, manganese toxicity and roots that were very sick. Thanks, Wes, for the information and great photos.

And, thanks to the many readers who order books, write kind letters and provide a focal point to learn about an area new to me.

The post Les Henry: Thank you to my readers appeared first on Grainews.

Smart Money Smart Kids by Dave Ramsey and Rachel Cruze. As a result of reading this book I’m giving my four-year-old granddaughter three jam jars for her birthday in June. One is labelled SPEND, one is labelled SAVE, and the third is labelled GIVE. Ramsey is the well-known founder of Financial Peace University. His graduates were on a recent Susie Larsen Live Podcast raving about the tools they learned to get out of severe credit card debt. I can only imagine the stories you’ve heard this winter about folks really struggling with finances. Ramsey uses the word “commission” not allowance when teaching kids to manage money. Check out his videos and be prepared to be challenged on your current money scripts.

Advice that Sticks by Dr. Moira Somers. This book is a great one for advisers with the tag line, “How to give financial advice that people will follow.” Dr. Somers is my financial psychologist and is helping our family navigate wealth transfer. Her work is also very helpful as I coach farm families struggling with maintaining family harmony and navigating the division of assets. She talks about being a “new immigrant” to wealth. Find her course at www.arlanacademy.com.

The Naked Opus…a novel approach to estate planning by Chris Delaney. Delaney is a lawyer with a holistic approach to planning which aligns beautifully with my coaching process. The naked reference alludes to open, honest, communication, and the opus alludes to your greatest work, the work of transferring wealth of all kinds to the next generation, not just money. Delaney also has a podcast called “Inception Family Wealth Hour.” Wealth continuity planning in his eyes is a process of planting, growing and harvesting. (Sounds a lot like farming!)

Moolala…why smart people do dumb things with their money by Bruce Sellery (www.moolala.ca) was such a great book, I bought a case to give to clients. Sellery asks, “What does money mean to you?” I attended one of his workshops and have great respect for his plain yet penetrating language. His podcast is “Moolala. Money made simple.” Podcasts are great company on walks or while cleaning, so get started today!

Wired for Wealth by Brad Klontz, Dr. Ted Klontz, and Rick Kahler helps you change your money mindsets that keep you trapped and unleash your wealth potential. You may not have been spending a lot during isolation and lockdown, but you might also be surprised that a scarcity mindset has kept you trapped. I agree with these authors that conflicts about money are really conflicts about money scripts. Get this book if you want to challenge your spouse and find some breakthrough tools to resolve family money issues, including financial infidelity and financially dependent children. February is a great time to face your money fears, understand your present reality, and make changes for your future.

Beyond Gold…true wealth for inheritors by Thayer Cheatham Willis. Willis is also the author of Navigating the Dark Side of Wealth…a life guide for inheritors. I’m in the middle of these books, and love the style of Willis’s writing. She specializes in helping people of all ages handle the psychological challenges of wealth. It’s become clear to me with these resources that we need to spend more time in agricultural families preparing the next generation to manage large amounts of wealth.

Dr. Somers calls this a “financial apprenticeship” of sorts. It is an intentional learning process to help the next generation manage small chunks of wealth in order to gain the skills to work with large sums. Another great book on being intentional is Intentional Wealth by Courtney Pullen.

Most families that I work with are very realistic with the thought, “they cannot take wealth with them when they die.” Their heart’s cry is for the family to get along now, and after the estate has been dispersed. I like to use the Twitter hashtag #healingstories4ag, because the sad stories are not motivating folks to get things done!

Visit aninheritance.com or familyfight.com to find a book by two wills lawyers Les Kotzer and Barry M. Fish called Where there’s an inheritance…stories from inside the world of two wills lawyers. Go to my blog and reread the post on the “Writing a will with Joy.” You did get your will updated this winter right?

We are not overrun this winter with meetings, bonspiels, tournaments, bingo, hockey, etc. There is time to ponder what you truly want from your life. I am saddened when meeting peers who are living on meagre incomes, facing a future of tight cash flow. Bank on Yourself…why every woman should plan financially to be single, even if she is not by Ardelle Harrison and Leslie McCormick, shows how to build confidence and protect yourself financially.

Money is a form of energy. It is also laden with tons of emotion in farm families. In my view, money does not equal love, but I don’t know what money means to you.

Use this column to order audiobooks, buy books, or borrow e-books from your library.

Every day is a great day to learn new skills to manage the resources that are at our disposal.

Be thankful for what you have. Be content. Be willing to find new ways to generate revenue and decrease spending.

Keep putting deposits in the emotional bank account of your farm family and be rich in relationship. Send me your book recommendations!

The post Froese: Intentional Wealth — and other books to spark conversations appeared first on Grainews.

The Field Guide to Classic Farm Tractors, Expanded Edition, features more than 400 models from 1900 to 1990 from the United States, Canada and Europe, including all the legends enthusiasts remember, plus a few rarities.

The photo-filled collection features landmark models from all major marques, including Allis-Chalmers, Case, Caterpillar, John Deer, Ford, International Harvester and Farmall. Smaller brands are also included such as Advance-Rumely, Cockshutt, Eagle, Fate-Root-Heath, Ferguson, Hart-Parr, Minneapolis-Moline and Oliver. Each model description is accompanied by spec charts with details such as revolutions per minute, horsepower, maximum speed, weight and more.

The Complete Book of Farmall Tractors: Every Model 1923-1973 is the complete reference for the legendary red machines. The book details the complete evolution of the popular marque’s iconic models including 250 colour and black and white images. The guide includes series evolution, historical context and technical details, accompanied by contemporary and historic images.

In this book, Pripps explores the entire range of Farmall tractors, from their inception to their final model year in 1973. He includes all models, from diesel and LPG versions to orchard tractors. Pripps also explains the evolution of Farmall lines and gives coverage to the entry-market Cub unveiled in 1947, as well as the Hundred series, right up to the cancellation of the Farmall name in 1973. The book’s content is organized chronologically and focuses on Farmall’s long history and evolution. Spec tables highlight key technical and performance specifications.

Both books were published in 2020 and are available at amazon.ca and chapters.indigo.ca. The Field Guide to Classic Farm Tractors, Expanded Edition is 256 pages and costs around $45 for the hardcover format. The Complete Book of Farmall Tractors: Every Model 1923-1973 can be found in the hardcover format at $57 and is 192 pages in length.

This has to be the best way to get your daily dose of iron.

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Founding family history

This summer we read through The International Harvester Company: A History of the Founding Families and Their Machines, written by Chaim M. Rosenberg and published by McFarland.

This isn’t the typical machinery coffee table book filled with glossy images that detail the evolution of a brand’s tractors and machinery. Instead, this paperback takes a deep dive into the personalities that made up the McCormick and Deering families, who eventually merged their firms to form International Harvester, once the world’s largest farm machinery manufacturer. It looks at the rise and, arguably, the fall of a family’s business empire.

There are some images in this book, but they are all black and white, and many of them are of the personalities behind the machines, not the machines themselves. What the book may lack in glossy images, it makes up for in interesting details of the two families. In fact, the book reads a little like a plot summary of the ’70s TV show Dallas.

Rosenberg sheds light on the idiosyncrasies, back-stabbing and bickering among members of the families that can best be described as the uber riche of their day, not to mention the hostile acts toward competitors that would have made J.R. Ewing proud.

The families were key figures in the early development of the city of Chicago, where their factories were located. In fact, the Great Fire reputedly started by Mrs. O’Leary’s cow cost the McCormick family a lot of money, because its factory was destroyed in it.

Many family members were prominent patrons of the arts, donating millions to art galleries and other institutions. And Rosenberg found many interactions by the McCormicks and Deerings with prominent political figures in U.S. history, such as Abraham Lincoln, who acted as a lawyer in one of the many civil suits Cyrus McCormick brought against his competitors.

This well researched book is an interesting profile in how the right invention at the right time lifted a pair of families from obscurity to the peak society and industry in a time of great social and political change, not only in the U.S. but also around the world. After reading this book, you may never look at that old IH tractor the same way again.

The 256 page book is available online from McFarlandBooks.com (or by calling 1-800-253-2187) for U.S. $49.95.

IH Cub how-to

There aren’t a whole lot of Farmall Cub tractors left, but of those that are a surprising number are still working for a living. Their size and design has made them the perfect machine for today’s market gardeners and small-scale hobby farmers — just like they were originally designed to be. A few manufacturers still make implements designed to work the little tractor.

A new book, Farmall Cub Encyclopedia, from Octane Press is aimed at those Cub owners. It provides a broad range of repair tips and is “the essential guide” to owning one of these little gems.

The 160-page book is available direct from the publisher online at Octanepress.com for U.S. $40.

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