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Volume 40, Number 5 | FEBRUARY 25, 2014

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PRACTICAL PRODUCTION TIPS FOR THE PRAIRIE FARMER

www.grainews.ca This picture from 2011 shows a spot where nitrogen application triggered iron chlorosis in soybeans (the yellowing plants).

The right amount of nitrogen for soybeans Between hearing of U.S. farmers adding extra nitrogen, and warnings about choosing fields with low nitrogen for soybeans, it’s easy to get confused PHOTO: JOHN HEARD, MAFRD

BY ANGELA LOVELL

S

ome western Canadian farmers new to soybeans are understandably a little confused about the issue of whether or not they need to add nitrogen fertilizer to achieve better yields, especially if they are sourcing production information from the U.S. Differences in soils types, conditions and crop rotations mean that U.S. information isn’t necessarily applicable to

most Canadian Prairie soybean production. While some U.S. farmers are adding nitrogen to soybeans, researchers don’t see benefits to adding nitrogen on the Canadian Prairies.

“They may be reading that some U.S. producers are putting nitrogen on their soybeans in the hopes of higher yields,” says John Heard, soil specialist with Manitoba, Agriculture, Food and Rural Development. “Those are for ultra high yields and it’s definitely not a sure thing.”

PRAIRIE TESTING Heard, in association with John Lee of AGVISE Laboratories and Ron Tone of Tone Ag Consulting, recently fertilized demonstration plots in 13 farmers’ fields in North Dakota and Manitoba.

“We called them ‘controlled observations’ to assess whether there is any detrimental affect or benefit to nitrogen on soybeans,” says Heard. “We started with a field and caused high nitrogen levels by putting on some fertilizer.

soybeans you should select fields with a low chance of iron chlorosis and that are low in nitrogen,” says Heard. “In fact the two may go hand-in-hand since in addition to impairing nodulation, high soil nitrate tends to worsen iron chlorosis of soybeans.”

The study observations showed, however, that it’s important to differentiate between new and established soybean fields. “Having high nitrogen in soil always reduced the

So the objective really wasn’t to fertilize soybeans with nitrogen, it was to study the impact of having soybeans grown in a soil that has high nitrogen.”

What’s causing a lot of new soybean growers some distress, says Heard, is the rule of thumb that excessive carryover nitrogen from a previous crop or cropping system may impair the ability of the rhizobium to develop nodules on a subsequent soybean crop. “It’s a common recommendation that as you select candidate fields for

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Columns ........................... 14 Crop Advisor’s Casebook

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Wheat & Chaff STAMPEDE

BY JERRY PALEN

LEEANN MINOGUE

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“Of course we should buy it.

Then when we need it we’ll have it.”

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hen our little boy was still a new baby and I was home alone on the farm with him, trying to get him to stop crying (he was a real crier), I often thought to myself, “If I was applying for a job looking after this child, nobody would think I was qualified. I probably wouldn’t even get called in for an interview.”

In his presentations at four Saskatchewan Pulse Growers regional meetings in February, Brent VanKoughnet, (farmer and operator of Agri Skills at Carman, Man.) was thinking along similar lines.

I heard him speak at the Regina SPG meeting.

VanKoughnet asked the 120 farmers in the meeting room to imagine we were investing $250 million in a company.

Then imagine we were getting together with the investing partners. “What would you want that CEO to do?” he asked.

Probably, he went on, investors would expect their newly hired CEO to take charge of the direction of the company, develop the company’s vision and take charge of the company’s direction.

Then he reminded us that most farmers already have at least a million dollars invested in their own companies — yet not all farmers are behaving like CEOs of their own farms.

BEING A CEO While he talked about the role of farm owners/managers, VanKoughnet put up a slide separating the responsibilities of this “job” into three categories: investor, farmer, and CEO. As “investors,” our role is to try to get the most from our assets and worry about our financial returns.

As “farmers,” we’re out in our fields, doing the day-to-day (or year-to-year) work — deciding what to plant, which herbicides to use, which machinery and inputs to buy and where and when to sell our grain.

The role of the farm’s chief executive officer is different.

It has a longer time horizon, where the CEO is looking at the systems on the farm, developing the farm’s long-term visions and plans, and worrying about the farm’s position in the marketplace and its relationships with suppliers and buyers.

Times are changing. I can’t imagine there would have been a talk like this at a commodity group meeting in 1952. But grain prices are falling, margins are shrinking and choosing the right inputs is becoming more challenging. Not a bad time to try doing things differently.

“We’d better show more care to our money and our investment than maybe we have in

the past,” VanKoughnet said.

Then he looped back to his starting point: “If you were in charge of someone else’s money, they would hold you more accountable.” Yikes. He had a pretty good point.

On his own 700-acre farm, VanKoughnet uses his yieldmapping technology to the max — continuously experimenting with different inputs and different techniques, just to make sure what he’s doing on his farm makes sense, and to confirm that his gut instincts really are the best solutions. (He also contracts with companies to do fieldsized experiments for profit, but that doesn’t mean his suggestion of more research trials is less valid or helpful for a more “typical” farm.)

VanKoughnet is a strong believer in testing agronomic theories for yourself on your own farm. Just because something you’re doing in the field is common practice doesn’t mean it’s the best practice. “You may have it right, but how do you know?” he asked.

If he was giving this talk 20 or even 10 years ago it would have been easier to dismiss. But these days, most farmers really do have the technology to do personal, localized research trials on their own farms. The data monitor is right there in the cab of the combine! We’re collecting the data anyway — why not use those fancy maps to test a few things out?

Sure, there’s not enough time to run complicated randomized trial strips in every field on a 10,000-acre farm when it’s crunch time, but maybe there’s time to do things differently in a few strips in a couple of fields.

Maybe we could find out for sure if that fungicide application was really necessary, or if a little more nitrogen would have been helpful.

VanKoughnet also had advice about making decisions.

“Don’t let someone else do the decision-making for you,” he said. It makes sense to outsource jobs that aren’t your strengths, like paying for accounting, legal, marketing or agronomic advice. But having someone give you information and options is different than having someone else actually make the decision. “Never lose control of the direction of where your farm’s going,” he said.

SUPPLIERS VanKoughnet had some interesting ideas when it comes to service providers.

His theory is that the best ag suppliers — bankers, chemical dealers, lawyers and others — are “picking their customers” these days. Sure, there are fewer farmers as farm size has expanded, but there still isn’t room for Syngenta to send all of their customers on a threeday trip to Grower University in Ontario.

When they’re looking for their preferred farmers — some-

one to send on a junket (or, uh, of course I mean important learning and networking opportunity), to approach with a special offer, or these days, for someone to call when there’s a limited opportunity to deliver just one load of grain to an otherwise plugged elevator — these reps are going to call the farmers with the most acres, or the farmers that are the most pleasant to deal with.

“You’re either on an A List, or a B List, or you’re not on a list,” VanKoughnet said. No matter which list you’re on (or off), he says even though farmers have a reputation as lone wolves, we now have to move to relationships with “interdependence.”

I see his point. With fewer service providers out there, we have to learn to live with the local dealer, or do an unreasonable amount of driving. It’s not as easy to just walk away from the table and go somewhere else as it used to be.

On his farm, VanKoughnet says he occasionally takes his input suppliers out for lunch.

This always surprises them — they expect to pick up the cheque. This kind of behaviour gives VanKoughnet a reputation as a customer who’s easy to deal with. He also asks reps how he can be a better customer. This may mean timing deliveries differently, or booking product at a particular time of the year.

For smaller farmers or farmers who’ve already burned some bridges with local dealers, this kind of relationship building could move you onto the A List, or at least get you back on the B List.

VanKoughnet had a lot more that he wanted to say (near the end of his talk, the slides were going by in a bit of a blur.) If you have a chance to hear him talk on the meeting circuit, I hope you’ll go to see him.

As for me, now that our son is seven years old, I have more or less gotten the hang of keeping him alive. I’m pretty sure I could at least get invited to an interview for the job of being his mother, but I doubt I’d qualify for an annual performance bonus.

IN THIS ISSUE Soybeans, soybeans, soybeans.

I’m hearing a lot about them in southeast Saskatchewan these days. Saskatchewan Agriculture’s Garry Hnatowitch was also at the SPG’s Regina meeting. “Nobody in this room is an expert on soybeans,” he reminded the crowd.

“Your interest is ahead of the research.”

We like to help when we can, so we’ve kicked off this issue with Angela Lovell’s look at nitrogen and soybeans. How important is it to plant them in a field without a lot of nitrogen carryover? Will soybean fix nitrogen for next year’s crop?

If you started on Page 1, you already know.

Leeann

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

Wheat & Chaff Farm safety

Powering through an outage

Y

ou’ve got the power.

Then zap — it’s gone!

The power can go off at any time of the year.

Whether from a flood, fire, winter storm or other service disruption, you need to prepare yourself, your family and your operation for an extended period of time “off the grid.” No power means no mechanical ventilation, no heat, no refrigeration and no water pump. Don’t wait until an emergency to put alternate systems in place.

Start by developing an emergency preparedness plan for your operation. An emergency preparedness plan should anticipate the type of disasters or emergencies that could occur on your farm, including an energy-system disruption, and describes strategies for managing those disasters so that personal safety isn’t compromised, and damage to operational infrastructure is kept to a minimum.

Your plan should include emergency contact numbers, standby or backup power systems, access to temporary heating solutions, procedures to follow to maintain your operation through an outage, an evacuation plan if you can’t

maintain a safe environment, and backup supplies for both your family and your farm.

In the planning process, you’ll want to review electronic control systems, which should have built-in battery backups and surge protectors to ensure that critical information is not lost and vital electrical equipment is able to run. Put standard operating procedures in place that identifies which equipment will need to be turned off during an outage to ensure a slow, safe reintroduction of your operational systems when power is restored.

In terms of backup power, whether you are running electrical equipment or keeping the heat on, most farms have standby or backup power systems in place in the event of an outage. If you don’t have any systems in place, or your existing systems no longer meet your needs, it might be time to do some research and go shopping. Otherwise, routinely test your backup systems to ensure they will work when you need them. If you need to install a new generator, you may be required to obtain an electrical permit from your province, which may only be

secured by a licensed electrical contractor. The Canadian Electrical Code states that a transfer switch must be used when connecting a generator to a wiring system. Without a transfer switch, your generator will feed power back into the power lines, creating a serious electrical hazard.

While we might wish we could be two places at once, the reality is that as a farm owner/ operator, you might not be on site when an outage occurs. So although it may seem intuitive, your emergency plan should also include all the directions for managing your operation in the event of a power outage so that whoever is on site at the time can respond appropriately.

Your goal in all this planning is to reduce the impact of an outage to your operation.

But your planning wouldn’t be complete without taking the needs of you and your family into consideration too.

After all, while you may pride yourself on your family’s independence and self-reliance, you also may be further away from help if you need it. As in any disaster situation, be prepared to operate for 72 hours

without any services. That means putting together a small package containing the basics (non-perishable food, drinking water, medications, emergency numbers, blankets, clothes, a first aid kit, can opener, flashlights, glow sticks, etc.) that will sustain you and your family for three days if things take a turn for the worst. It may seem silly when there are probably two months worth of canned soup collecting dust in your pantry, but if you have to leave in an emergency, you will appreciate your thorough preparation.

Assuming you don’t have to evacuate your farm during an outage, take precautions when heating your home. Keep barbecues, portable generators, and propane or kerosene heaters outdoors and out of poorly ventilated areas. They generate carbon monoxide, a scentless but deadly gas that can lead to loss of consciousness and death. Keep a supply of antifreeze on hand to protect plumbing from freezing. If you have a wood-burning stove or fireplace, keep a fire stoked.

If you have a natural gas fireplace, check to see if it will operate without electricity.

Weather Lore

Telephone lines

You might be from the Prairies if...

Leeann

You don’t acknowledge any prime ministers after Diefenbaker.

Agronomy tips… from the field

A smarter way to rate soybean maturity

I

GIVE US YOUR BEST SHOT Marie Grant sent us this photo of her great granddaughter (Ella Grant). Ella is helping her dad clean the cattle trailer after delivering bulls. At the time the photo was taken, Ella was about 18 months old. She is the fifth generation farmer. This photo was taken at Grant Lodge Farms just outside of Edam, Saskatchewan.

Thank you for sharing this, Marie! We will send you a cheque for $25. (Maybe you can put it toward Ella’s wages!)

Send your best shot to leeann.minogue@fbcpublishing. com. Please send only one or two photos at a time and include your name and address, the names of anyone in the photo, where the photo was taken and a bit about what was going on that day. A little write-up about your farm is welcome, too. Please ensure that images are of high resolution (1 MB is preferred), and if the image includes a person, we need to be able to see their face clearly.

S

f you find selecting soybean varieties based on Crop Heat Units (CHUs) unreliable, it’s probably not you. It’s the system itself.

Here’s the problem. The CHU system works fine with corn, where accumulated heat determines maturity. But with soybeans, sunlight and day length are better predictors of maturity. That’s why soybean breeders are migrating to a new “Maturity Grouping” system.

The Maturity Grouping system

Canadian Agriculture Safety Association — www.casa-acsa.ca.

Weather Lore

When telephone lines whistle and hum They tell of a storm, soon to come. uch winds are called Aeolian winds, named for Aeolus, Greek god of the winds.

While telephone lines are generally underground these days, this saying is also true of any object that interrupts the wind’s path and produces a whistling sound.

This proverb probably also works because of the tendency of sound to travel better before a storm. In cold weather, telephone lines would tighten, producing a louder noise and cold weather is often followed by a storm. † Shirley Byers’ book “Never Sell Your Hen on a Rainy Day” explores over 100 weather rhymes and sayings. It is available from McNally Robinson at: www.mcnallyrobinson.com.

Power outages aren’t just a sheltering issue for your family; they can also create food safety issues. To reduce the risk of food-borne illnesses, keep your eye on the thermometers in your fridge and freezer. Use ice blocks to keep the temperature below 4 C, or move perishables to smaller coolers. If the temperature rises above 4 C in your fridge or freezer, you’ll need to throw out meat, milk products, eggs, cut fruit, salad dressings, open sauces, casseroles, pizza, custards and pudding. A full freezer will hold its temperature for approximately 48 hours if the door remains closed (but throw away any ready-to-eat items that have come into contact with meat juices). And if you aren’t sure, throw it out.

For detailed information on how to prepare for a power outage emergency, check getprepared.gc.ca or download a sample emergency preparedness plan form from the Canadian Agricultural Safety Association at: http:// casa-acsa.ca/sites/default/ files/2.6%20Emergency%20 Plan.pdf. †

ranks varieties in a range between 000 (earliest maturing) to 00.9 (late maturing). Most Prairie varieties fall within this narrow, easyto-follow range of 00.1 to 00.9 Long-season varieties with ratings of 00.7, 00.8 and 00.9 are best suited only for the Red River Valley.

Mid-season varieties, rated 00.4, 00.5 or 00.6, are good for much of the rest of Manitoba.

While growers in the outermost range for soybeans would be wise

to choose short-season varieties rated 00.1, 00.2 or 00.3. Growers in Saskatchewan will soon benefit from even shorter-season varieties, in the 000 (or “triple zero”) range.

To find the ideal match for your fields, it pays to talk over soybean variety selection with your local retailer. † This agronomy tip is brought to you by Aaron Bouchard, agronomic service representative for Syngenta Canada Inc. Aaron, who farms in Saskatchewan, is a Certified Crop Adviser and a P.Ag.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Cover Stories Crop nutrition » CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

The right amount of nitrogen for soybeans

1 6 6 6 D u b l i n Av e n u e , W i n n i p e g , MB R 3 H 0 H 1 w w w. g r a i n e w s . c a PUBLI SH ER

amount of nodules,” says Heard.

“But there’s no gold star for having lots of nodules. You just need enough nodules to express full yield. If previous soybean crops were properly nodulated, they appeared to have enough nodules.

We found only a couple of our field plots, that were typically first year soybeans, where the excessive nitrogen in the soil impaired nodulation enough to lower yield and also the protein level.”

So the take home message is that the rule of thumb for selecting soybean fields with lower nitrogen soil levels may not be as critical where there have been previously successful soybean crops. “We didn’t see any advantage in adding more nitrogen,” says Heard. “We doubt it’s beneficial to put nitrogen on. There were good yields this year and there was no advantage to putting more nitrogen on. I think this notion will go away quickly.” Also, adds Heard, this year the high nitrate levels did not contribute to iron chlorosis in the demonstrations.

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Nitrogen carry-over?

Another misconception that may also come from more southerly climates is that there will be a nitrogen carryover from soybeans that farmers can take advantage of, reducing the amount of nitrogen fertilizer for next year’s crop.

“That comes from the idea that soybeans are fixing their own nitrogen and they are leaving some nitrogen behind so when farmers are in a corn and soybean rotation, as they often are in Iowa and other parts of the U.S. corn belt, they may be applying 50 pounds less nitrogen on their corn. So there is a misconception that there is some kind of nitrogen credit but that’s not really correct,” says John Schmidt, a research scientist with DuPont Pioneer.

“It’s correct that they apply less nitrogen to their corn when they are following soybeans but the primary reason for that is because the soybean residue breaks down much faster than corn residue and so the nitrogen is not tied up.”

Soybeans always use whatever nitrogen is available, whether it’s residual nitrogen from previous crops or nitrogen that mineralizes from organic matter. “Once people have grown soybeans in northern areas they learn that there’s very little carryover of nitrogen, the lowest carryover of nitrogen of any crop according to the soil tests,” says Heard. “It’s because soybeans are so efficient at cleaning the system.

If they don’t need to make nitrogen they won’t, they’ll use what’s there. What we found was there was always a lot less nitrogen left at the end of the year than what we put on because the plant used it.”

Salvage situation Additional nitrogen is beneficial, says Heard, in a salvage situation, where a soybean crop has not been properly inoculated, which is cru-

Andrew Winkels Phone: (204) 954-1414 Fax: (204) 944-5562 Email: andrew.winkels@fbcpublishing.com Ad ve rtis ing Ser vice s Co-o rdin ato r

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photos: john heard, mafrd

These pictures show the effect of nitrogen on soybean root development. The plant on the top had 100 pounds of nitrogen (as urea). The check plant (on the bottom) grew with no added nitrogen. cial for nodulation. “Because we have so many virgin soybean fields we will have mistakes happen where a farmer doesn’t get the crop properly inoculated because the machinery plugs or something,” says Heard. “Farmers should regularly scout their fields and assess nodulation so they know whether they need to make a salvage operation, because if they do not have nodules the crop it will need to be fed with nitrogen.”

In another experiment a few years ago, Heard tested nitrogen application in a salvage situation and found that timing was important to achieve good yields. “In Ontario

they say get the nitrogen on early during flowering and our observations were that it’s of more benefit to put it on a little later when the pods are filling,” says Heard. “That might simply be because we have better organic matter levels in our soil that will carry the plant through that early flowering stage, but the additional nitrogen is greatly needed for seed filling.”

It doesn’t appear that there are any economic or production advantages in Western Canada to additional application of nitrogen on soybeans, but farmers should soil test to find out how or if nitrogen levels are likely to affect

a soybean crop. “If nitrogen levels are very high I don’t think we need to tell farmers don’t plant soybeans there, they just need to understand that if they’re going to plant soybeans there it’s likely to reduce nodule numbers,” says Heard. “Inoculation is still very important and now that crop margins are a little tighter maybe a crop that really needs nitrogen like canola or wheat would benefit better by being planted on that soil.” † Angela Lovell is a freelance writer, editor and communications specialist living and working in Manitoba. Find her online at www.angelalovell.ca.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

5

Features SEEDING

Seeding with thousand kernel rates Agronomists promote using thousand kernel rates to calculate seeding rates.

But many farmers still haven’t picked up the habit

BY ANDREA HILDERMAN

T

alk to almost any agronomist, and a lot of farmers, and they will tell you that they calculate seeding rates using 1,000-kernel weights (TKW) and target plant populations. They don’t use some arbitrary and antiquated volume measure. Why aren’t all farmers using this strategy?

“The root of the reason, I believe, is there’s not enough research,” says Steve Larocque, owner of Beyond Agronomy in central Alberta. Sarah Foster, president and senior seed analyst at 20/20 Seed Labs also believes that relatively few farmers calculate seeding rate using this method. “When I poll a room during a presentation and ask, very few are really aware of this practice, and I try to raise awareness at every talk I do. It’s just starting to become a conversation.”

The ultimate goal of calculating a seeding rate from TKW is to put enough seeds into the ground to give a targeted plant population.

Germination and vigour also need to be known and are used in the calculation, as is a seed mortality estimate and row spacing.

“We seed everything using TKW.” — Dan Owen

THOUSAND KERNEL WEIGHT TKW is the weight in grams of 1,000 kernels of seed. TKW can vary between crops and classes of cereals, and it will vary within the same variety depending on the field it was grown, the environmental conditions experienced in a particular season and year over year. “Even a small difference in TKW will make a big difference in seeding rate, depending on the crop,” explains Foster. “And getting the TKW from the lab is a quick and easy test to have done.”

TKW will vary between crops, obviously, but also between classes in the same crop, between varieties in a class and even within a variety depending on where and when it was grown.

2013 data from 20/20 Seed Labs shows that canola TKW will range anywhere from 1.04 grams to 6.07 grams. In Saskatchewan, 20/20’s data has wheat TKWs ranging from 33.66 to 48.46 grams. In southern Alberta the TKW range for wheat is 26.59 to 50.84, but take a look at a single class like durum in southern Alberta this year, the TKW ranges from 41.04 grams to 48.86 grams.

And within varieties there is variability. Tracy Court of Court Seeds at Plumas, Manitoba shared their farm data. In 2012, Canada Western Red Spring wheat varieties Carberry and Glenn had TKWs of 35.0 and 30.2 grams respectively, and in 2013 those same TKWs were 37.7 and 34.0 grams respectively. “This year we

are seeing large seed size and very big 1,000 kernel weights across all crop types and varieties,” says Court. “Producers will definitely need to seed a little heavier this spring.”

After TKW is determined, the next most important variable to know is the target plant population you are aiming for. This will vary by crop, by region and even by the intended end-use, but there are usually general guidelines that work from. Dan Owen is the agronomy manager at Hudye Soil Services who operate in Norquay, Kamsack and Sturgis, Saskatchewan. “We seed everything using TKW and I encourage all my customers to seed that

way as well,” says Owen. “For our own cereal research plots, I target about 36 plants per square foot versus a lot of guys who target only 26-30 plants per square foot.” Owen prefers the higher plant populations because he sees less tillering, a bigger main head which increases yield, even maturity and a thicker crop canopy with improved weed suppression.

“We are pushing crops aggressively for yield here, so we are also pushing plant populations. I preach more main heads equals more yield, and management strategies to support that higher yield also need to be in place.”

At some point, if plant populations are too high lodging and

increased disease incidence will become issues.

GERMINATION TESTING Seed germination testing is critically important to the calculation.

An allowance must also be made for seedling mortality which can occur for any number of reasons including disease, insect damage, fertilizer burn in the seed row, being seeded too deep, etc.

Seeding rate calculators are available on all three provincial government websites with complete instructions on their use. The Alberta calculator, in particular, is very use-friendly. Just pick a crop from a pull-down menu, plug in

the numbers for TKW, germination, etc., and a seeding rate in pounds per acre is automatically calculated for you.

“Using bushels per acre to determine seeding rate can leave you with a thin plant stand, excess tillering, delayed maturity and a reduction in yield,” says Larocque. “On the flip side, you could be seeding heavier than you need to and increase the changes of lodging from heavy plant populations and really just wasting money on seed that doesn’t need to be planted.” † Andrea Hilderman Andrea Hilderman has her master’s degree in weed science and is a member of the Manitoba Institute of Agrologists. She writes from Winnipeg, Man.

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Always read and follow label directions.

AgSolutions is a registered trade-mark of BASF Corporation; and AgCelence, and PRIAXOR are registered trade-marks of BASF SE, all used with permission by BASF Canada Inc. PRIAXOR DS should be used in a preventative disease control program. © 2014 BASF Canada Inc. 110200811_PriaxorSEC2014_GN_8.125x10_v1.indd 1

For Newsprint

2013-12-31 10:01 AM

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Features Crop production

Our corn grazing in 2013 Kevin Elmy’s been experimenting with varieties for corn grazing

By Kevin Elmy

L

ike the last few years, our 2013 corn year started behind the eight ball. The winter of 2012 posed some seed logistics challenges. Some varieties had seed supply issues, seed size options were limited, new varieties were available but without local trials. These issues added to seasonal stress. Then, for us, snow and rain delayed our projected seeding date.

By the time one of our Kinze planters came back from a customer seeding corn, it was June 14.

In 2012, the field had six acres of corn and 34 acres of three cover crops that we grazed off. We had pre-worked the field three times during the spring of 2013, trying to dry it out.

We seeded 21 varieties from Hyland, Thunder, and Canamaize Seeds. Varieties included TH 3388, TH 3381, TH 3382, TH 8781, TH 3383, TH 2146, BAXXOS, HL SR35, HL SR22, HL S4120, HL 3093, HL 3085, HL R219, X 12002 XR, X 29013, LF 755R, LF 728R, MZ 1677R, LF 815R, MZ 1440R, and CM 533R. All varieties, except the Canamaize 533R, were seeded on 36-inch centers at 26,666 seeds per acre (three acres per bag).

On the farm, there was just under 14 inches (356 mm) of rain from May 1 to the end of September. From seeding to the end of September, there were 1842 Corn Heat Units (CHU) and from May 1 to the end of September, there were 2142 CHU. This was the first year we did not seed soybeans in between the corn rows because of the late seeding date. In past years we have seeded RoundUp Ready soybeans to help compete with weeds, increase production, increase protein availability to the cattle and potentially fix some extra nitrogen. The Kinze planter we use has finger units, so once we are done seeding corn, we load up with soybeans and seed the soybeans at the same rate as the corn. The soybeans are preinoculated with liquid inoculant.

It ended up adding 0.5 dry tonnes per acre.

With the open fall, the corn ranged from late milk to early dent.

We have always recommended that one third of the corn field be seeded to a variety that needs the amount of corn heat units you would normally get. For our area, the Yorkton area, we use a 2250 to 2300 CHU variety. For the rest of the field, we add 200 to 400 CHU requirements, so for us that’s 2400 to 2600 CHU varieties. This will vary with the animal type we are feeding, seeding date and local conditions. This helps manage grain overload and variations in climate and maximizes tonnage produced and clean up.

Results We sampled the field November 9, measuring 1/1000 of an acre of each variety — weighing, chipping and sampling for feed tests.

We took a close look at two plants from two varieties, BAXXOS and HL SR35. We took the plants apart, weighing each of the cob, leaves,

upper stalk and lower stalk, and then had feed tests done at SGS Agrifood Laboratories in Guelph, Ont. We considered the cob being the divide between the upper and lower stalk. Our observations: • By November 9, BAXXOS was in late dough stage, where HL SR35 was in late milk.

• Moisture was around 50 per cent for the BAXXOS; the HL SR35 was just over 60 per cent.

• BAXXOS had 57 per cent of its dry weight in the cob; HL SR35 was at 28 per cent.

• Cob protein was over three per cent higher in the HL SR35 cob.

• Leaves’ dry weight and protein were similar.

• Upper stalk weight was higher on the HL SR35, as was the lower stalk, as well as the protein, Relative Feed Value (RFV).

• Lignin of the upper stalk of the BAXXOS was higher than the HL SR335.

• Energy was exactly the same for the leaves, and all stalks.

• Percent starch was in most cases under one per cent.

• Milk production per acre was significantly higher with the BAXXOS cob, but the rest of the plant was higher in the HL SR35 and more evenly balanced through the HL SR35.

• Total grazing days were similar, slightly higher in BAXXOS due to the more mature cob that contributed to an extra 64 grazing days per acre. Once again, the grazing days per acre attributed to plant parts was more consistent in the HL SR35.

For our variety trial, dry tonnes per acre averaged 2.80. Not bad, considering the late seeding and cool end of July and early August.

For dry tonnes, Canamaize 533R, TH 3388 and TH3382 were the top performers.

Protein averaged 9.73 per cent, ranging from 8.48 to 10.89 per cent.

Relative feed values (RFV) averaged 135, ranging from 94 to 180.

Net energy for maintenance averaged 1.63 megacalories per kilogram, ranging from 1.42 to 1.78, while total digestible nutrients averaged 66.88 per cent, ranging from 61.56 to 70.62 per cent.

Forage quality was down this year, once again due to late seeding and cool silking period. Calculated kilograms milk produced per acre averaged 3437, where last year was almost triple that. Grazing days, assuming 35 pounds of dry matter per cow per day, averaged 173, ranging from 86 to 220.

We’ll post the final results on our website (www.friendlyacres.sk.ca) and on our Facebook page.

Grazing just started mid-December so there is no comments yet on variety clean up. Overall stand is below normal, due to excess moisture through June and cool conditions. Grazing cost per day will be higher than average, but still cheaper than feeding bales in corrals. Seed supplies are better than last year, but not great for most varieties. † Kevin Elmy operates Friendly Acres Seed Farm, along with his wife, Christina, and parents, Robert and Verene, near Saltcoats, Sask.

Contact him at 306-744-2779 or visit www. friendlyacres.sk.ca.

PLANT TRIAL RESULTS BAXXOS Wet

Dry

(t/ac.)

(t/ac.)

Cob

4.03

1.97

9.74

Leaves

0.91

0.50

Lower stalk

1.82

Upper stalk Totals

Protein

RFV*

Net Energy

Grazing

Milk

(Mcal/kg)

(Days/ac.)

(kg/ac.)

182

1.81

124

2566

13.06

78

1.32

32

469

0.69

6.11

62

1.32

43

603

0.52

0.30

6.17

63

1.32

19

208

7.28

3.46

8.77

218

3,846

Wet

Dry

Protein

Net Energy

Grazing

Milk

(t/ac.)

(t/ac.)

(Mcal/kg)

(Days/ac.)

(kg/ac.)

Cob

5.20

0.95

13.03

118

1.57

60

911

Leaves

1.04

0.67

13.08

81

1.32

42

664

Lower stalk

4.55

1.15

7.29

75

1.32

72

768

Upper stalk

1.04

0.51

6.52

73

1.32

32

376

Totals

11.83

3.27

9.98

206

2,719

HL SR35 RFV

* RFV = Relative feed values

In-depth tests of BAXXOS and HL SR35 varieties gave us the following results.

BUILT FOR

BARLEY.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

7

Features Farm management

Looking for land If you’re a farmer looking to rent land or a landowner looking for a renter, there are two good online options

By Leeann Minogue

S

photos: leeann minogue

Top: Shannon and Kevin Veurink (pictured), along with Kevin’s brother Andrew and his wife Brittany are proud to match renters to the right owners. Left: Lyndon Lisitza’s renterra.ca offers farmers an auction-based system for land rental.

ometimes farmers who want to rent land and landowners looing for good renters have trouble finding each other. Maybe the landowner inherited land, in a place she never lived. Maybe investors bought land in an area where they don’t know any local farmers.

Often farmers who would like to rent more land don’t even find out about rental opportunities until the land is already off the market.

When the landowner and renter do find each other, there’s really no open, transparent way for them to set a price. Without official published numbers, farmers are reduced to getting their information about rental rates from coffee row Two new web services have recently come online to help farmers and landowners overcome these problems.

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RentThisLand.com is an Ontariobased service that matches landowners with renters. Prairie-based Renterra.ca also matches renters with owners, using an open auction system.

RentThisLand.com RentThisLand.com was started

by Kevin Veurink and his brother Andrew. Kevin’s wife Shannon Veurink is the president of the company.

So far, more than 130 landowners have signed up on RentThisLand.com.

How it works — for renters: Potential renters start by filling out a profile for perspective tenants.

Shannon Veurink says they encourage potential renters to use this profile to explain why they would be the best tenant choice. “Sometimes we look at what they’ve written and it just makes us so proud of the ag community,” Veurink says. “It’s really great to see people proud of their operations.”

When renters see land for rent on the website that might be of interest, they can submit bids to the landowner. Renters pay a nominal fee of $20 to bid (or can buy a package rate for a lower per-bid price.) If they are successful, RentThisLand.com will charge their credit card 1.5 per cent of the rental price as commission.

How it works — for landowners: There is no charge for landowners to use this site (although they can buy road signs for $34.99, to bring some extra attention to their land.)

Once the site has received five bids for a piece of land, the landowners will be notified. They’ll be able to read the profiles submitted by the bidders and select a tenant.

The benefits: While receiving at least five bids for their land gives the landowner a chance to understand the market value of their land, Veurink stresses that this process is not an auction. Rather, she says, “we’re trying to encourage landowners and educate landowners that, while getting a good price for your land is important, that’s not the be all and end all.”

“In a market that is really demand driven and where there is a lot of focus on price,” Veurink says, “it can be hard for young, beginning farmers without personal connections to get a foot in the door.” In the end, she says, “We’re focused on getting the best match.”

In October 2013, RentThisLand. com won an Ontario Premier’s Innovation Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence. On March 5, 2014, the Veurinks will be on “Dragon’s Den,” the popular CBC TV show, looking for more investment capital for their business. If they receive money, they plan to use it to increase awareness of their service, especially in Western Canada.

renterra.ca With more landowners becoming disconnected from local farmers, Lyndon Lisitza saw an opportunity. His plans for an online land rental auction won the

University of Saskatchewan’s Tech Venture Challenge in 2012. The award came with $50,000 and a year of office space at Innovation Place in Saskatoon. Now his GISbased system is up and running.

To date, there are about 2,000 users on Lisitza’s renterra.ca site — about 1,800 farmers and 200 land owners.

How it works — for renters: Farmers who want to rent land can join renterra.ca for free.

Once a farmer enters his legal land location, he can choose to receive email notifications when land within a certain distance of his home quarter comes up for rent on the site. The site uses a GIS mapping system, but Lisitza says, “Typically, I’ll just give people a call.”

Once land is listed, potential renters will see relevant information about that land: the assessment value, soil class, chemical and fertilizer history and previous yield history. “I hope that I provide enough information that the people who are interested can go online and place a bid,” Lisitza says.

How it works — for landowners: The landowner can specify if the auctions will be based on a straight dollars per acre rate, or on a crop share basis.

Landowners can design the terms and conditions of the auction. Lisitza reminds them that setting an excessive amount of terms and conditions might mean fewer bidders, but in the end, that’s the owners’ decision. Lisitza will also work with the owners to set a reserve price.

Landowners don’t have to take the highest bidder. Once the auction is over, they can look at the farm profile of the winning bidder: the number of acres farmed, land rented vs. leased, machinery used and past yields. If the landowner doesn’t choose the highest bidder, he can look at the next name. Because cash rental auctions are based on one dollar per acre increments, the second highest bid will be only slightly lower.

The benefits: When land is rented in a sealed bid process, where bidders don’t know how much others are offering, Lisitza says the result will often end with a “winner’s curse” — a situation where the winning bid is substantially higher than the second highest bid. With renterra.ca’s one dollar bid increments, this won’t be a factor.

If you have enough competition, Lisitza says, which in this situation means anywhere from five to eight bidders, “what you will get is a market solution.”

After the sale closes, Lisitza says “then the real work begins.”

Setting the market price “is just the first dance between the landowner and the tenant.” The next step is actually setting up the contract between the two parties.

Lisitza helps them negotiate subtle aspects that can’t be captured by a website. “You really need to hammer in to the details,” he says.

“You’re bridging the gap between two people who sometimes don’t know each other from a hole in the wall.” † Leeann Minogue is the editor of Grainews.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Features Crop varieties

Variety is the spice of life Here is a look at the new pulse varieties coming to the market for spring 2014

By Bunyamin Tar’an, Bert Vandenberg and Tom Warkentin

C

ourtesy of the Saskatchewn Pulse Growers, here is a round up of the new pulse varieties available for 2014.

New lentil varieties for 2014 Large green lentils: The Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation (SCIC) insures about 80 per cent of the lentil crop — in 2013 this represented about 500,000 acres of insured large green lentils. Of the reported variety acres, CDC Greenland, CDC Impower, and CDC Improve were the most widely grown. Based on SCIC data, about 30 per cent of all lentil varieties including the large greens are listed as “unreported” or “unknown.”

New Varieties: Seed of CDC Greenstar has entered the rapid multiplication stage. A large quantity of Breeder seed was released in 2013 to Select growers. CDC Greenstar consistently outyields all other large green lentil varieties and many of the red varieties, similar to CDC Maxim. It has very good ascochyta resistance and better anthracnose resistance ratings than all other large greens. The seed of CDC Greenstar is larger than most of the other green varieties, slightly smaller than CDC Improve (CL).

Looking Ahead: We expect to seed steady improvement in large green lentil varieties in terms of agronomic and marketing characteristics.

Other greens and specialty lentils: In 2013 SCIC insured almost 265,000 acres of small and medium green lentils plus specialty types, but most of these were small greens. For the insured small green acres where variety is reported, about 55 per cent were CDC Invincible (CL) and about 35 per cent were CDC Viceroy. All other small green varieties and all other

market classes make up the rest, each variety at less than four per cent of the group total.

The total reported for French green varieties was a little over 20,000 acres and about 40 per cent of those acres were CDC Peridot (CL) and 20 per cent CDC LeMay.

that we can remain competitive in the red lentil business.

New Pea Varieties for 2014 Yellow peas: CDC Meadow has been the most widely grown field pea cul-

tivar in Saskatchewan since 2012 with CDC Golden in second place, according to data from the SCIC. CDC Meadow has also been one of the top varieties in Alberta, Manitoba, and the northern United States (U.S.).

It has been popular with growers due to its consistently high yield,

lodging resistance, competitiveness with weeds, and nice seed type.

The next most widely grown yellow pea varieties in Saskatchewan in 2013 were CDC Bronco, CDC Treasure, Delta, and Agassiz.

New Varieties: Certified seed of CDC Saffron

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New Varieties: CDC Asterix is an up and coming extra small green variety with seeds that are about 20 per cent smaller compared to CDC Viceroy. It is a conventional type with some possibility for specialized marketing in specific regions.

Looking Ahead: We plan to release Breeder seed of the conventional French green variety CDC Marble (yield is 119 per cent of Maxim) and possibly 3592-13, a conventional small green (110 per cent of Maxim).

CDC Marble outyields all other lentil lines regardless of market class and we are using it to establish a new higher- yielding genetic base for all market classes. All varieties are on track for conversion to imidazolinone (IMI) tolerance.

Red lentils: We estimate that 65 per cent of the 830,000 red lentil acres reported on a variety basis by the SCIC in 2013 were CDC Maxim (CL). The real figure could be higher if all the acres were reported by variety. The extra small red varieties, CDC Rosetown, CDC Imperial (CL), CDC Impala (CL), are now less than two per cent, in total, of the area. CDC Dazil (CL) and CDC Imaz (CL) appear to be gaining acres.

Conventional varieties like CDC Redcoat, CDC Redcliff, CDC Redbow, and CDC Rosebud are grown on a very limited scale right now because they were released after CDC Maxim (CL). As growers try them out, local performance will determine which of these become more widely grown.

Looking ahead: Several promising new varieties of red lentil are in the multiplication stage. The main focus is on improving yield performance so

BayerCropScience.ca/Varro or 1 888-283-6847 or contact your Bayer CropScience representative.

Always read and follow label directions. Varro™ is a trademark of the Bayer Group. Bayer CropScience is a member of CropLife Canada.

FS:6.3335” F:6.5835”

BCS.10182718.Varro

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In 2013 in Saskatchewan, a little over 20,000 acres were seeded to French green lentils.

About 40 per cent of those acres were CDC Peridot (CL).

For the seventh year in a row, CDC Striker was the most widely grown green pea variety in Saskatchewan.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

9

Features

13.167”

13.167”

should become available in 2014; it has good yield (107 per cent of CDC Golden in the south and 113 per cent of CDC Golden in the northern region) and medium-large smooth, round seeds.

Certified seed of CDC Hornet became available in 2013; it has good yield (100 per cent of CDC Golden in the south and 105 per cent in the north) with good lodging resistance and medium maturity. Certified seed of CDC Treasure was available for the first time in 2013; it has good yield (97 per cent of CDC Golden in the south and 109

per cent in the north) with good lodging resistance and early maturity. Certified seed of CDC Centennial (large seed size) and CDC Prosper (small seed size) is also available in 2014.

Looking Ahead: Breeder seed of CDC Amarillo (2462-30) was released for the first time in 2012. CDC Amarillo has had strong yield performance in Saskatchewan regional trials over the past three years with a mean yield of 111 per cent of CDC Golden in the south and 125 per cent

of CDC Golden in the north.

CDC Amarillo is relatively tall with one of the best lodging resistance ratings among pea varieties in Western Canada.

Two new high yielding yellow pea varieties under consideration are CDC 2847-21 and CDC 2950-19.

Green peas: For the seventh year in a row, CDC Striker was the most widely grown green pea variety in Saskatchewan. It has been popular with growers due to its consistently high yield, lodging

13.167”

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C-78-02/14-10168062-E

New Varieties: Certified seed of CDC Raezer should become available in 2014 or 2015; it has good yield in the northern regions, with powdery mildew resistance and nice seed type similar to CDC Striker.

Breeder seed of CDC Limerick was released for the first time in 2012. CDC Limerick has had strong yield performance in Saskatchewan regional trials over the past three years with a mean yield of 105 per cent for CDC Golden in the south and 110 per cent in the north. CDC Limerick has nice seed traits, but with a greater protein concentration than other green or yellow pea varieties. This may provide an advantage in fractionation markets.

B:8”

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resistance, and smooth round durable seeds, which have excellent bleaching resistance and are preferred in the market. CDC Patrick was the second most widely grown green pea variety in Saskatchewan in 2013. On average, it is higher yielding than CDC Striker and CDC Sage, while maintaining good seed quality. CDC Patrick generally performs better in somewhat drier seasons compared to wetter seasons. CDC Sage was the third most widely grown green pea variety in Saskatchewan; it has a smaller seed size than CDC Striker, but with nice quality as well. Cooper and SW Sergeant were the next most widely grown green pea varieties in Saskatchewan in 2013.

CDC Tetris is an “Espace type” variety with blocky seed shape which has specific demand in China for snack food markets.

Certified seed of CDC Tetris first became available in 2013. CDC Pluto is a green pea variety with small round seeds, good bleaching resistance, and intense green colour which should fit well into rehydration and canning markets. Certified seed of CDC Pluto should become available in 2014.

S:8”

Freedom from wild oats.

Looking Ahead: CDC Greenwater (CDC 24724) is likely the highest yielding green pea variety in Western Canada at present. It is relatively tall with good lodging resistance and somewhat late maturity, similar to Cooper and CDC Limerick. Seed size is slightly smaller than CDC Striker. Breeder seed of CDC 2472-4 will be released for the first time in 2014.

Dun, Maple and forage pea: CDC Rocket and CDC Acer are the dominant maple pea varieties in Saskatchewan. CDC Rocket fits better in the northern part of the province due to its earlier maturity than CDC Acer, which fits better in the south.

CDC Tucker, CDC Leroy and CDC Horizon are forage pea varieties with high biomass yield, powdery mildew resistance, good lodging resistance and semileafless leaf type. These varieties produce on average four to five tonnes per acre of forage dry matter, similar to that of forage barley, but with greater protein concentration.

New Varieties: CDC Mosaic is a maple pea variety which has similar seed type to CDC Acer but with improved lodging resistance.

Certified seed of CDC Mosaic should come available in 2014.

Breeder seed of the dun pea variety CDC Dakota was first released in 2010. It was one of the top yielders in the Saskatchewan regional trial in 2010-2013. The dun type would typically be dehulled and sold in human consumption markets in India. Certified seed of CDC Dakota should become available in 2014.

Looking Ahead: CDC 3012-1LT is a new maple pea variety which has similar seed type to CDC Rocket but with improved yield. Breeder seed is expected to be released for the first time in 2015. Two new red cotyledon pea varieties were released in 2013, so keep an eye out for this new market class in the years ahead.

New Chickpea Varieties for 2014 The major objectives of the chickpea breeding program at the CDC are high yield potential with acceptable seed quality characteristics, and reduced production risk through improved resistance to ascochyta blight, early maturity, and plant characteristics for better crop management. Introgression of the imidazolinone (IMI) herbicide tolerance into new breeding lines is in full swing. In the next few years, we should see more IMI-tolerant chickpeas available. We continue to explore

» continued on page 12

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Varro.104REV1.indd

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grainews.ca /

BCS.10182718.

Grainews Insertion Date: February 25, 2014

Black

Bayer CropScience PAGE: 1

10182718

M: 13.167” x 8” Bleed: None

elvetica Neue LT Std (65 Medium; OpenType)

Production Contact Numbers: 403 261 7161 403 261 7152

photos: saskatchewan pulse growers

Breeder seed of the conventional French green variety CDC Marble is planned for release (yield is 119 per cent of Maxim).

CDC Mosaic is a maple pea variety with a similar seed type to CDC Acer but with improved lodging resistance. Certified CDC Mosaic seed should come available in 2014.

10

/ grainews.ca

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Features » CONTINUED FROM PAGE 11

VARIETY IS THE SPICE OF LIFE genomic and molecular techniques for use in selection program whenever feasible.

In the Market: In the past several years CDC Frontier and Amit continued to be the dominating kabuli varieties for the seeded acres, followed by smaller acres of CDC Leader, CDC Orion, CDC Luna, and CDC Alma. Over the past two years we have had relatively warm weather until September, allowing the chickpea crop to mature in time in most areas. In 2014, it is anticipated ample supply of CDC Leader and CDC Orion.

Both varieties are kabuli type, medium to large seeded (greater than nine mm diametre) with

good yield and slightly earlier maturing than CDC Frontier.

A limited amount of seed for a desi cultivar CDC Consul (formerly known as 603-3) was released to select growers in 2013. CDC Consul has a light tan seed coat colour, which is one of the desirable visual seed characteristics of desi type. The long-term (6-year) yield average of CDC Consul is 110 per cent of the check cultivar (Amit) on both Brown and Dark Brown Soil zones. Seed size of CDC Consul on average is 300g/1000 seeds with a long-term ascochyta score of 4.0. CDC Consul has a medium-late maturity range similar to CDC Vanguard.

Growers are strongly advised that an initial fungicide application is needed for all chickpea varieties at the seedling to preflowering stage, in order to limit early ascochyta spore development and spread. Growers are required to monitor their fields

diligently for disease and spray if necessary. At the CDC chickpea breeding program, we only sprayed fungicide twice for ascochyta control in all of our nurseries. Timing for the first spray is

An initial fungicide application is needed for all chickpea varieties very critical. It is recommended that chickpea is planted on stubble, especially in wet years. It is also important to avoid heavy clay soil that retains moisture, and avoid lower lying or poorly drained fields.

Looking Ahead: In 2014 breeder seed of a new kabuli variety, 1041-3, will be available to select seed growers.

1041-3 has high yield potential on both Brown and Dark Brown soil zones, comparable to CDC Leader and CDC Frontier. It has fair resistance to ascochyta blight with a long-term score of 4.7 on a zero to nine scale (zero being immune/no symptom and nine being plants completely blighted).

The average seed weight of 10413 is 425g/1000 seeds (nine to 10 mm diametre). On average, 10413 matured a few days earlier than the check variety Amit.

This article is reprinted with the permission of the Saskatchewan Pulse Growers. It originally appeared in SPG’s magazine “Pulse Point.” For more information about SPG or the variety release program, visit www. sask pulse.com. † Dr. Bunyamin Tar’an, Dr. Bert Vandenberg and Dr. Tom Warkentin are all plant breeders at the University of Saskatchewan.

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Another chance for chickpeas?

I

f you’re one of those farmers who had a really bad experience with chickpeas more t h a n a d e c ade ago, Dr. Bunyamin Ta r ’ a n f r o m t h e C r o p Development Center told farmers at the Saskatchewan Pulse Growers 2013 regional meeting in Regina that it may be time to give chickpeas another chance.

In 2001, Saskatchewan farmers seeded 1.1 million acres of chickpeas. In 2013, there were only 180,000 acres. Apparently, ascochyta in chickpeas was not fun.

Tar’an says varieties have improved since then. “Ten years ago,” he says, “varieties were very poor for ascochyta, now they’re moderate.”

Some newer varieties are also earlier maturing.

Newer varieties are moderately resistant, but you’ll still need a fungicide. “The first spray is very important,” says Tar’an. “Do it early. At the eight- to 10-node stage.” He suggests Bravo for that first spray. “It’s cheap and it still works.”

What you should not do, Tar’an says, is use strobilurin twice in a row (this includes Headline and Quadris). These chemicals have a single-site mode of action. Tar’an says using them repeatedly “can make the fungicide tolerant.” †

Leeann Minogue

Plan

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At the Saskatchewan Pulse Growers 2013 regional meeting in Regina, Dr. Bunyamin Tar’an urged jaded growers to give chickpeas another try.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

11

Features

Up and coming pea varieties

C

DC Meadow and CDC Golden are currently the acreage kings for yellow peas in Saskatchewan.

But two young guns could usurp one leader.

CDC Saffron and Amarillo “could take the place of Meadow, for example.” Dr. Tom Warkentin told CropSphere delegates in Saskatoon in January. Warkentin specializes in pulse breeding and research at the University of Saskatchewan.

CDC Amarillo was released in 2012. It’s a top yielder in northern and southern regions, and has one of the best lodging ratings in Western Canada. CDC Saffron yields well, too. Seeds are medium to large. Other top yielders include Agassiz, Abarth, Argus and Early Star.

Among green peas, CDC Striker was still the most popular variety, even though it was released in 2002.

CDC Raezer, which is a descendant

Seed of the year

L

aird Green Lentils were selected as the 2013-14 winner of “Seed of the Year.”

The Laird green lentil was developed by Dr. Alfred E. Slinkard of the Crop Development Centre (CDC) at the University of Saskatchewan. Laird was the first lentil variety to be licensed in Canada.

The release of Laird in 1980 was the single most important factor contributing to the rapid expansion of the lentil industry in Canada.

The variety name Laird has become the international standard for the large green lentils. A number of pulse growers are still growing Laird today, 35 years after its release. All subsequent large green lentil varieties developed in Canada have Laird lentil in their ancestry.

The Seed of the Year award was designed by the University of Guelph and SeCan with support from the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, and Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

Additional support has been provided by various commodity boards each year.

Program sponsors include: Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Alberta Barley Commission, Canterra Seeds, Cargill, Parrish & Heimbecker Limited, Canadian Seed Growers Association, Viterra, Richardson International, SeCan and Western Grains Research Foundation.

Seed of the Year is designed to provide recognition to publicly-developed varieties that have made a significant contribution to the economy, agriculture, and the Canadian public in general. † “Seed of the Year” press release

of Striker, is a contender for top future variety. Its seed is similar to Striker, and yield and powdery mildew resistance are good.

CDC Limerick could also be a future favourite among growers.

It’s one of the top yielders and has a greater protein concentration than other varieties.

Farmers might also want to take a look at high-yielding CDC Dakota, a dun variety. Though there are no commercial acres in Western Canada, Warkentin said he’s like to see farmers give it a try.

“Typically the Australians are selling dun peas into India where they’re dehulled and used with yellow pea applications.”

Research pipeline Farmers will have hardier pea varieties in the future, if crop researchers have their way.

Pulse researchers have also

added root rot resistance to their to-do lists, he said.

Future pea varieties might be able to take the heat and still yield well. “If we get hot spells in early July when the peas are flowering, we know that can dampen yield.”

“My theory is that the reason we had such good yields in 2013 was because the temperature was hovering around 23, not 29, for most of July,” Warkentin said.

Gotta risk it to get the biscuit

CDC Amarillo was released in 2012.

The riskiest crops can also be the most profitable, Dr. Bunyamin Tar’an, chickpea breeder with the University of Saskatchewan, told CropSphere delegates. “Just like when you put your money in stocks.”

Chickpeas offered the most potential net profit, according to numbers Tar’an sourced

from the January 2 issue of the Western Producer.

But chickpeas can train wreck if farmers don’t keep a lid on disease.

Chickpea breeders aim for two fungicide applications maximum, says Tar’an. He said they will sometimes spray a third time, but no more. “You don’t have to spray five, six times.”

photos: saskatchewan pulse growers

Hitting the crop at the eightnode stage the first time around is critical. “At that stage, chickpea doesn’t look like a crop. It looks like you’re spraying the ground because the plant is very small.”

Tar’an also recommends rotating fungicides on subsequent applications to avoid resistance. † Lisa Guenther is a field editor for Grainews.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Features Farm management

Different ways to lease land Here are four ways to lease land, and some tips to consider when you’re negotiating a rental contract

By Rebeca Kuropatwa

T

here are many ways to lease land. Here are four options, and some things you should consider when negotiating contracts.

1. Crop share lease Traditionally, crop sharing arrangements have been based on one-third of crop sales. But as inputs have become more necessary and expensive, it often makes sense for landowners negotiating crop share arrangements to factor both parties’ contributions toward input costs

into the rental rate. This consideration can result in higher yields and more profits for both parties. Without this consideration, for example, tenants have less incentive to apply extra fertilizer if they must pay 100 per cent of the extra costs, and give up one-third of the extra yields.

If crop input costs are shared, the tenant and the landlord must agree on the amount and type of crop inputs to be applied and how the costs will be shared.

When many crops were sold to the Canadian Wheat Board, it was much simpler for landlords and tenants to agree on marketing plans. Now, landlords and tenants

must agree on when the grain should be sold and at what price.

2. Cash lease With a cash lease, the tenant makes a fixed cash payment to the landlord for the use of the land — and facilities, if any are included. The tenant receives all of the income and pays all of the expenses. This is a good option for landowners looking for a stable income and minimal involvement with the farm.

This option gives lessees more flexibility and independence in production and management decisions.

Even under a cash lease arrangement, landowners may wish to collect and keep information about inputs and crop yields. This information could be useful for the next tenant, and helpful for landowners wishing to ensure proper stewardship of the land.

3. Flexible cash lease In a flexible cash lease, rental payments vary each year with the price of grain. In this case, the risk of fluctuating grain prices is shared with the landowner.

Because the annual rate adjusts over time, longer-term leases can

be negotiated, encouraging a longterm approach to agronomics.

4. Custom farming arrangements A custom farming arrangement provides an alternative to leasing for landowners who wish to remain classified as farmers under the Income Tax Act. An important tax factor to consider is the potential loss of the capital gain rollover to a child. Farmers who rent land to someone other than a spouse or child may not qualify for the capital gain rollover.

A custom farming arrangement could be used to bridge this gap. Ask a tax professional for advice first, but in general, rental income earned by a landlord can be included as earning when calculating the maximum allowable Registered Retirement Savings Plan contributions and in calculating Canada Pension Plan contributions.

This arrangement also allows a landowner to retain close control of the farm without actually becoming involved in the operations.

More considerations Before entering into a lease arrangement, here are some things to keep in mind: • The landlord and tenant should be open and honest with each other, so they can cordially resolve any disagreements.

• To maximize long-term profit, the terms of the lease should be fair to both the landlord and the tenant.

• Written agreements help prevent future conflict between the landlord and tenant.

• Leases should be flexible enough to permit fair adjustments in the event of unexpected situations.

• Leases should be adapted to suit each individual situation, but also simple enough to work.

• The lease period should be long enough to allow the tenant to adopt (and profit from) good agronomic practices.

In the future, there is likely to be more, not less leased land.

“There is an emerging trend to retained ownership of farmland instead of outright sale at retirement,” says Roy Arnott, business development specialist, farm management, Manitoba Agriculture, Food, and Rural Development in Killarney. This results in a higher percentage of land owned by non-farmers.

In most farm operations, what is important is care and control of the land. “Negotiating longterm land rental agreements that allow the farm to maintain care and control of a suitable land base for the entire operation (including their existing and owned land) and to operate is as a profitable business is the goal of most farm businesses,” says Arnott. “The trend to increasing farm size and the increasing cost of purchasing land make renting the most viable option for both.” †

www.fmccrop.ca

Always read and follow label directions. FMC and Authority are trademarks and Investing in farming’s future is a service mark of FMC Corporation. ©2014 FMC Corporation. All rights reserved. F101-032481 2/14

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a professional writer in Winnipeg, Man. F101-032481-02_AuthorityAd_Casket_Grainnews.indd 1

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

13

Features New crops

Sorghum and pearl millet Sorghum is typically grown in warmer, dryer climates. But Prairie interest is growing

By Rebeca Kuropatwa

Benefits

n recent years, interest in sorghum has been increasing.

New sorghum hybrids can be grown in colder climates with shorter growing seasons.

One of sorghum’s biggest proponents in Canada is Dr. Om P. Dangi, president and CEO of Agriculture Environmental Renewal Canada (AERC) Inc., a bio-agro seed company specializing in the development of sorghum and pearl millet hybrids for grain and forage. Dangi has developed hybrids that can be grown in every Canadian province.

AERC’s research and development has resulted in three grain sorghum hybrids, two silage sorghum hybrids (one of them with sweet stem) and one each of forage pearl millet, sweet stalk pearl millet and grain pearl miller hybrid.

AERC has been primarily focused on research and market development, but is now ready to begin full-scale commercialization.

“In 2013, AERC crops occupied an estimated area of 15,000 acres in Ontario, Quebec and the Atlantic provinces, and 3,000 acres in Alberta,” said Dangi. “The company has already secured orders for 136 tons from major seed distributing companies for the fiscal year 2013-14 (about 24,000 acres).”

Unlike some sorghum seed, AERC’s forage sorghum hybrids have recorded negligible amounts of prussic acid levels after freezing, and are not harmful to cattle.

“While sorghum can mainly be grown on the Prairies for silage or green chop, unlike corn silage (that can be cut only once per season), the sorghum Sudan grass hybrids and forage pearl millet developed by AERC allow three cuts to be taken in a season (and at least two on the Prairies.)

Dangi says sorghum and millet possess agronomic, nutritional and environmental advantages over grain and forage crops grown traditionally in Canada. “They outperform traditional grain and forage crops on light soils and under conditions of moisture stress,” Dangi said. They also require less fertilizer than traditional crops.

Farmers considering growing sorghum should first investigate potential markets. “The commercial demand for sorghum and millet in Canada and in the U.S. is astonishing,” said Dangi. Dangi’s market research shows unsatisfied North American demand for

I

sorghum and millet flour, cake mixes and opaque beer. Much of this demand springs from ethnic populations. These crops are also suitable for gluten-free diets. “It’s estimated that as many as one in 300 of the population could be allergic to gluten,” Dangi says.

Sorghum can also be used as a source of industrial starch for human food and for ethanol production.

Dangi believes sorghum and millet are here to stay, thanks to AERC’s developed links with the Canadian Seed Growers Association, farmers and product utilizing companies. † Rebeca Kuropatwa is a freelance writer in Winnipeg, Man.

photos: dr. om dangi

Top: New sorghum hybrids have been developed that can be grow in colder climates with shorter growing seasons. Bottom: Sorghum is the fifth most important cereal crop in the world.

Sorghum Sorghum is the fifth most important cereal crop in the world after wheat, rice, corn and barley.

Pearl millet is the most important cereal crop in the hot and dry areas of the world.

“While sorghum was introduced in the U.S. only in recent years, the U.S. is now the world’s largest producer of grain sorghum,” said Dangi.

According to Jim Todd, transition crop specialist with Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food and Ministry of Rural Affairs, “Sorghum has a higher water and nitrogen use efficiency than corn, but has similar silage feed value.

“Sweet stalk sorghum is being studied as a source of sweet sap for alternative syrup production by maple syrup growers in Quebec, Ontario and some north-eastern U.S. states.

“Sorghum is often added to a crop rotation to help in break up weed and disease cycles,” Todd says.

Todd has seen increasing interest on the part of southern Ontario farmers in growing grain and forage sorghum.

Sorghum is more drought-tolerant than corn and will grow on more marginal land.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Columns Guarding wealth

Shelter in a financial storm Disinflation and deflation mean times of falling asset prices, which means tough calls ahead for investors

By Andrew Allentuck

A

s I write this column, the big stock exchanges in the U.S. and Canada are tumbling by a few hundred points.

The news driving down the markets is all bad: American corporate quarterly earnings reports are disappointing, Canadian houses are reported as massively overvalued and there is fear of disinflation and outright deflation in Europe and even nibbles of deflation in Canada.

Let’s see where all of this goes. Corporate earnings are not bad in most cases, but after a banner year for American corporate earnings in the U.S., a five per cent boost that is less than the 10 per cent investors expected is taken as bad news. House price overvaluation goes along with consumer debt stretched to the breaking point in Canada. When interest rates rise, as they will, consumers will have trouble not just paying off their mortgages, but finding new money for cars and home appliances.

Deutsche Bank issued a report at the beginning of February which said that Canadian house prices are the most overvalued in the industrialized world. Other banks say “among” the most overvalued, but it makes no difference. The upside on house prices in major cities is limited and that means people will be unable to use their homes as ATMs, reamortizing their equity via home equity loans.

The Economist, the British news weekly, says that the Canadian dollar remains eight per cent overvalued on a terms of trade basis, that is, what it costs to buy similar goods in the U.S. and other countries.

All that spells reduced consumer spending. Given that consumers rescued the U.S. in the 2008-09 meltdown, the outlook is grim.

Ten years ago, it would have been thousands and 20 years ago tens of thousands.

Similarly, nobody worries about asset prices. Stocks go up, a new car depreciates at breathtaking speed and it’s nothing

fall ever faster. Depression is the outcome of shrinking prices, then reduced liquidity in the market.

The idea of deflation is foreign to most Canadian and American investors. The mod-

prices up. We could get negative CPI numbers.” Kresic is among the most savvy of bond managers in Canada. His macroeconomic views are high respected.

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And now deflation Now comes disinflation and deflation. Disinflation means a lower rate of inflation — not necessarily a bad thing.

Canada’s inflation rate is down from 1.2 per cent for all of 2013 to about 0.9 per cent, the latest number reported for the end of November.

Outright deflation is another thing. A sustained decline in prices can produce a debt-deflation downward spiral. If prices start to decline broadly, businesses will dump their goods at cheaper prices, driving down the price levels further and giving still more firms in incentive to dump.

Falling prices are themselves not a bad thing. One can buy a good television — colour, flat screen, maybe high definition — for a few hundred dollars.

to cause concern. Yet a broadly based decline in the consumer price index is seen as a cause for alarm. Indeed, it is, given the price spiral of deflation.

The reason a broad decline in prices is bad is because it portends rising real costs of paying off loans.

Falling prices imply declining prices of what companies sell and what individuals can charge for their services. Corporate and individual incomes decline and the ability of persons and companies to pay their loans also falls. But taxes have to be paid and loans serviced. That means more money shifts to government and less money is available for spending on new goods and services. Prices continue to

est experience of minute price declines for a month or two in 2008 made little impact. Few investors remember the price collapses in the 1930s. Yet the problem is returning.

Christine Lagarde, head of the International Monetary Fund, warned of the growing danger of deflation. “With inflation running below many banks’ targets, we see rising risks of deflation, which could prove disastrous for the recovery,” she said in a speech at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., on January 15 of this year.

“Deflation fears are here.

They have not gone away,” says Chris Kresic, senior partner at Jarislowsky Fraser Ltd. in Toronto.

“That is what is driving bond

but if prices continue to plummet, even bulls become bearish.

And so to bonds Bond markets are thriving.

As I write this story, world bond prices have picked up and yields, which move opposite to bond prices, are falling. The bonds doing best are government bonds which are regarded as default-proof.

The evidence is in the numbers.

For the first five weeks of 2014, U.S. Treasury bonds generated a 1.78 per cent return. Government of Canada bonds are up 2.39 per cent. European investment grade corporate bonds, which have both default risk and a potential downside if a basket of Euros

and pounds declines, are up 4.68 per cent. These are huge leaps of value. The bond market is a tortoise in changing prices compared to the stock market hare.

For investors, the choice is to go with last year’s momentum of major stock markets or shelter in bonds. Stocks were ascendant until the end of 2013. But in 2014, stock investors willing to take more risk are paying more and getting less forward earnings. This can’t last. The alternative is to take a contrarian position in bonds and add the potential for disinflation in Canada, northern Europe, or deflation in southern Europe.

If nothing else, a drop in price levels sustained over a few quarters would push more investors to government bonds, and perhaps top investment grade corporate bonds.

The Bank of Canada’s response to potential deflation can already be seen in the dropping loonie. More exports, more jobs, and higher prices for consumer goods should be bullish for the economy. Yet the present CPI trend rates are so low that even a drop in consumer confidence or more bad winter weather delaying or cancelling consumer purchases could push down inflation a little to disinflation.

Actual deflation would be a matter of going from inflation just below one per cent to something mildly negative. It’s not much of a leap.

Before you call up your stock broker and order a heap of government bonds, consider the risks. The DEX bond universe, which is the index of all government and corporate bonds sold in Canada, has a present yield of about 2.50 per cent to maturity.

The breakeven on the index is 42 basis points, that is, a little less than half a per cent. So if interest rates were to rise more than 42 basis points in the next 12 months, the bond’s interest would be wiped out and from then on, investors would be taking losses.

You can shelter your bond portfolio by buying bonds with terms of less than five years or even less than two, but the cash yield on these short bonds is very small. If you do go short, then you can rise rising interest rates upward, rolling low yield shorts into newer bonds, perhaps adding a few years to the new bonds to capture the term premium, that is, the extra amount bonds pay as you add years to maturity.

In the end, there is no safety. Doing nothing exposes you to deflation risk, buying stocks exposes you to losses and buying bonds adds price risk to interest rate declines. But not all of these things will happen together. And that, friends, is why it is wise to diversify. † Andrew Allentuck’s latest book, “When Can I Retire? Planning Your Financial Life After Work,” was published in 2011 by Penguin Canada.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Columns HART ATTACKS

Great play opens the GMO can of worms A play about Percy Schmeiser’s legal dispute with Monsanto over GMO canola raises many questions LEE HART

I

love a good mystery, but when watching a movie or reading a book, I also like the puzzle to be solved. That’s why recently watching the play Seeds staged here in Calgary was so disturbing. In many respects it left as much unanswered as it did answered.

Seeds is a play about the 2004 court case involving Saskatchewan farmer Percy Schmeiser and Monsanto’s dispute over the use of growing genetically modified canola without the company’s

technical use agreement (TUA) in place. Schmeiser, obviously a long time “brown bagger” who had no use for Monsanto and TUAs, claimed any GMO canola seeds on his land were volunteers that blew in from passing grain trucks, while Monsanto claimed it was stolen seed deliberately planted by the Bruno, Sask. farmer. The court ruled in Monsanto’s favour.

It is a decade old story now, but the questions it raised are still relevant and still unanswered today. The question isn’t so much about how this GMO canola ended up on Schmeiser’s farm, but more of the big picture stuff: “Who owns life?” and “Is the technology of genetically modified crops harmful in any respect?”

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TWO SIDES TO THE ISSUE Admittedly I went to this Port Parole Production (Quebec) written by Annabel Soutar with some preconceived attitude. Billed as a modern David-versus-Goliath docudrama I figured it would be a Monsanto-bashing event.

Here’s a multinational chemical giant, pounding this poor old Saskatchewan farmer into the dirt, with the subplot that GMOs are the scourge of the 21st century.

Well there were some moments of that, and the crowd at the sold out Theatre Junction venue in Calgary did have what I considered a strong leaning toward tree-hugger thinking. But the play itself is extremely well balanced.

Yes, Monsanto came off as a bully at times, but you also heard that Percy Schmeiser wasn’t necessarily a choirboy, either.

Eric Peterson who always does a great job (he was the grumpy and bumbling character of Oscar in the Canadian TV comedy Corner Gas) played the role of Percy Schmeiser.

One of the interesting features of this play is that there was no dramatic license used in writing the script. According to the production company, 100 per cent of the words spoken were taken from recorded interviews and court tran-

scripts. Soutar took months, if not a few years to interview and record the real people involved as this story unfolded. And then she masterfully wove all that into the script for the play. There are only eight actors on stage, although with simple, quick costume changes and a change of voice and demeanor they played the roles of a few dozen characters — lawyers, judges, farmers, Monsanto representatives, seed dealers and researchers. The theatre always impresses me.

And even my wife, who doesn’t know a whole lot more about canola other than there are beautiful yellow fields in late June and it makes a nice affordable vegetable oil, followed and was entertained and informed during the twoand-a-half hour production.

THE REAL MYSTERY The play looks at the frustration of trying to sort out whether GMO technology is good or bad.

Some researchers vigorously wave a red flag — we just don’t know the consequences of manipulating genes — and others say there is no scientific evidence that shows undo risk, and if we waited for every possible question to be answered we would never get anywhere.

That is the real unsolved mystery of this production. What is the impact of GMO technology?

Most farmers embrace it and yet many don’t. The reality is, like it or not, if you don’t use GMO chances are your production efficiency and profitability will be reduced.

And now with talk of introducing GMO wheat, and even moving it into other classes of crops such as alfalfa the momentum is building, rather than waning. And I am no further ahead.

I would highly recommend you try to catch a production of Seeds. The whole set fits on one stage, the acting is great, and through the magic of theatre one second you can be in Percy’s living room and kitchen, and in another you can be with him giving a speech in South Africa or accepting an award in New Delhi, or in front of the chief justice of the Supreme Court of Canada. Very well done.

In the meantime, I am going to focus more on watching old episodes of “The Big Bang Theory” It is still science based, but at least I know when it’s over, it’s over.

Leonard gets the girl, and Sheldon, well Sheldon is Sheldon. † Lee Hart is a field editor for Grainews in Calgary, Contact him at 403-592-1964 or by email at lee@fbcpublishing.com.

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TOBAN DYCK

W

hat unspeakable, twisted horrors took place in this building? None, but the mind wanders and that’s why I stay away from our hog barn. The nails holding the plywood to the rafters have rusted to headless spikes.

Many sheets have partially fallen, some are still holding on, and the rest have let go entirely. The scene that has emerged as a result of the building’s inner decay is a mix of vapour barrier hanging like curtains at various spots, fallen insulation, plywood, and the steel penning that once held pigs captive. The barn is long. Sunlight only penetrates the first few feet. After that, you’re on your own.

The barns, abandoned houses, deserted machinery, all tell a story.

They say what kinds of implements made the most sense at the time.

That rusted three-row cultivator grown into the tree line beside your house was once possibly the biggest and best implement available.

The hog barn acts as a physical barrier between my parents’ house and ours. And it shares in some of the charm many old, farm buildings

have: weathered exterior and dated design. But I’m fishing; there’s really no reason to keep it. The barn has been without hogs for nearly two decades. To spend money tearing down a barn that no longer generates revenue and costs nothing to keep is a dilemma shared by many farmers and property owners.

“The old barns are seldom used for their original purposes. But, they were often built so sturdy, having a grace that is not often found in today’s utilitarian agricultural structures, that they are being put to new uses,” wrote Ineke Van Zeeland in A History of Barns in Canada.

WHAT TO DO? The only use for our barn is perhaps renting it out as a movie set.

And judging from the many yards visible from gravel roads across the Prairies, ours isn’t the only farm dealing with outbuildings.

But what to do with the outbuildings that are beyond redemption?

Farmers, you are impressive.

Jumping into this field in my 30s, I have never met a group of people so finely attuned to the money that flows through their hands.

They have to be, I’m learning.

And these processes should no longer intimidate me like they do.

It’s a farmer’s business weighing input costs against possible earn-

ings. And in this rubric, paying to demolish an old, useless building doesn’t make sense.

This may be my decision someday. And if I push myself to answer now how I would respond to this dilemma, I can’t. Our hog barn has a story, too. My grandpa built the barn as an investment opportunity for my father. The barn had a long, successful run.

But at some point, heritage, story, nostalgia, budget will have to give in a little. In some cases, the space is needed for other, more functional buildings. Aesthetics are also a concern. Some of these buildings, and you know which ones I’m talking about, would be better off torn down, if only to put your best foot forward and present a farmyard that cares.

I’m less calloused than this recommendation suggests. I’m not courageous enough to say, unequivocally, “tear it down.” Farm history is too charming, and too closely tied to ancestry for me make that call. But there are too many yards out there with buildings that are unsafe to use and that once served as storage facilities for junk nobody will ever use again.

Keep what you feel are antiques, build a coffee table or hutch from the siding and beams to preserve the story, and consider demolition.

The dilemma is my point, though. The decision shouldn’t be easy nor made overnight. Our hog barn will stay for a while. The tin roof has kept it watertight and free of rot, and, who knows, once the horror-movie qualities have been exercised, it may serve a purpose.

But putting it off may only be delaying the inevitable. † Toban Dyck is a freelance writer and a new farmer on an old farm. Follow him on Twitter @tobandyck or email tobandyck@gmail.com.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

17

Columns SOILS AND CROPS

LES HENRY

O

n Sunday, January 5, I went out mid-morning to get a shot of fresh air — and it was fresh.

The mercury thermometer on the garage stops at 40 below, which we all understand. The mercury was nearly curled up in the bottom: -37 C. Much of Canada and the northern U.S. has experienced a few good old 1950s style winters lately.

The No. 1 news item is the extreme and unusual cold. To a 73-year-old it is not that unusual.

So, it seemed to be the right time for me to take another crack at global warming. Let it be known I have my farm hat on — I have no academic expertise in climate science.

THE LONG-TERM VIEW My Christmas holiday reading this year included a book entitled Climate Through the Ages by C.E.P. Brooks, a prominent British meteorologist.

Brooks wrote about the several glacial and inter-glacial periods and the many possible reasons why they occurred. Of carbon dioxide, he had this to say: “Carbon dioxide can never have been an important factor in climatic variations.”

Brooks tabulated numbers of “great storms, floods, heavy rain or wet summers” in Europe for successive 50 year time periods. From AD 1000 to 1500 there were as many as 28 such events in a 50-year period.

Brooks’ book was published in London in 1926. It was book No. 27,923 acquired by the University of Saskatchewan library. We still need libraries. I make great use of internet access to information, but stumbled on this book while looking for similar titles.

It appears that global warming actually ended about the turn of the century. The Global Warmers are making excuses and telling us it is a pause in an uphill trend.

One thing that puzzles me: What thermometers do they average to come up with a “global” average temperature? I have asked several and have yet to receive an answer.

Tundra

But, much of the research agenda is still driven by “mitigating” global warming. Most research proposals stand a much better chance of funding if they include the magic words.

One thing we can all agree on — droughts will return. Tree ring counters warn us that past droughts have made the 1930s look like a cakewalk. We also have a lot of research on “mitigating” drought.

The only serious way I know to mitigate drought is to irrigate.

If we in Saskatchewan are worried about future droughts — and we should be —then irrigation projects from Lake Diefenbaker should be built NOW. A wet cycle is when irrigation should be built so it is available for the drought when it comes.

The one that really makes me angry is the business of tying a bag on both ends of a cow to see how much gas they expel. What in the name of common sense do they think the millions of buffalo did?

THE DATA It is a well-established fact that any global warming that has taken place on the Canadian Prairies happened only in the months of January to March. July, if anything has been cooler. We grow crops in the summer. In fact we have cool July to credit for at least part of bumper canola crops in recent years. The graphs of Swift Current data from 1886 to 2007 were presented in this column in February 2010. They clearly show January to March as the months that drive the annual average higher or lower over time. So, when a yearly average is computed it is skewed by the much bigger range of winter temperatures.

I recently stumbled on a 1964 report of the then Water Studies Institute at the University of Saskatchewan. They analyzed historical temperature data from four Saskatchewan stations. They also reported that the spread between high and low for January (about 5 C) was much more than the spread between high and low in July (about 1 C). The data from the four stations is shown in Figure 1.

From the time the sod was broken to the Second World War there was a general increase in temperatures, followed by a sharp decrease in the cold and wet 1950s. As

late as 1977 the annual meeting of the Saskatchewan Institute of Agrologists had the theme “Dealing with a Colder Climate.”

The Swift Current 10-year moving average for mean annual temperature (Figure 2) shows where we are at now. It shows the sharp temperature increase through 70s and 80s and more or less flat since mid 90s.

So, why is the world in such a flap? Climate has been changing for 4 billion years. To Mother Nature 100 years is but a flick of the eyelash. I think mankind flatters ourselves greatly when we think we have much influence.

The increase in CO2 in the atmosphere is much more consistent and seems to carry on. Guess what our major plant nutrient is? Carbon.

And we access it as CO2 from the atmosphere. How much of our huge 2013 crop is credited to the increased CO2 in the atmosphere?

36

DEGREES F

Climate has been changing for the last four billion years. Long-term weather forecasts are anyone’s guess

AT FOUR SASKATCHEWAN STATIONS (°F)

34

34 32 30 1890

1900

1910 1920 1930 FINAL YEAR OF EACH DECADE

1940

1950

5.0 4.5 4.0 3.5 3.0 2.5 2.0 1.5

10-YEAR MOVING AVERAGE

1.0 0.5 0.0 1895

1905

1915

1925

1935

1945

1955

1965

1975

1985

1995

Feel the

Rush

FORECASTS: KUDOS TO ENVIRONMENT CANADA Let us end on an upbeat note. As recently as 10 years ago weather forecasts were not taken too seriously. But, I am sure many readers have noticed the improvement in recent years.

Farmers now plan the next few days based on the forecast — particularly temperature. Rain/ snow is harder but the forecast of general pattern of precipitation is very much improved.

This COLD winter the temperature forecasts have been very close as much as five days out. But, please do not try to tell me that long-term predictions are anything more than a crap shoot.

Editor’s note: While of course Les Henry is correct, we still need libraries, the full text of C.E.P. Brooks’ book “Climate Through the Ages” can be read online at home for free at www. archive.org. At that site, search for “Climate Throuch the ages” — (yes, search with “through” misspelled to find it quickly.)

J.L.(Les) Henry is a former professor and extension specialist at the University of Saskatchewan. He farms at Dundurn, Sask.

He recently finished a second printing of “Henry’s Handbook of Soil and Water,” a book that mixes the basics and practical aspects of soil, fertilizer and farming. Les will cover the shipping and GST for “Grainews” readers. Simply send a cheque for $50 to Henry Perspectives, 143 Tucker Cres, Saskatoon, SK, S7H 3H7, and he will dispatch a signed book.

1960

FIG 2. SWIFT CURRENT MEAN ANNUAL TEMPERATURE

DEGREES C

We need a little global warming

FIG 1. TEN YEAR MOVING AVERAGES 1895-1964

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Columns OFF FARM INVESTING

The future of natural gas What will happen to natural gas prices in the future?

Andy Sirki’s been giving this some thought ANDY SIRSKI

L

ately I have taken time to look into the natural gas industry. In his book Cold, Hungry and in the Dark: Exploding the Natural Gas Supply Myth, Bill Powers suggests that predictions of unlimited amounts of cheap natural gas are just hype.

He says it’s impossible for the U.S. to produce enough natural gas in the upcoming years to be self sufficient, much less an exporter.

As we all know, the U.S. president is pushing hard to reduce the use of coal and use natural gas in its place. Five nuclear reactors were shut down last year, and I don’t think any new ones started up.

Powers suggests that the U.S. is headed for an energy crunch, and that the price of natural gas is going to go up.

Powers agrees that the U.S. could easily have almost enough home grown oil in upcoming years. Many oil fields produce for decades. Already American oil refineries can buy almost as much sweet oil as they need close to home, but they do need some heavy oil, which of course comes from the oil sands. Venezuela has been shipping heavy crude to the U.S., but Venezuela has political problems so it has production problems. Mexico is inviting foreign money to drill for oil and sooner or later that new supply will come to markets.

Yes, consumption is rising around the world. China is burning something like six million barrels of oil a day, and India is close behind and demand is rising, but I suspect oil supply is going to go up faster than new demand. Lower priced oil should be good for airlines and railway businesses and consumers.

But Powers suggests that natural gas is different. He quotes numbers to show that new fracked natural gas wells can reach peak production quickly, but within three years most of them lose 80 to 95 per cent of that production. He says decline will happen as new demand comes from homes, businesses and electric power stations; both new and converted from coal.

I also saw a documentary about natural gas wells in the shale development region in eastern U.S. Apparently about 5,000 gallons of toxic chemicals are pumped into each new well. Stuff that could end up in the underground water systems. The documentary said the area is getting four to five new wells a day, which adds up to a lot of toxic stuff being pumped into the shale zone. Many wonder how long that can go on before either regulations stop the pumping of toxic material or the countryside gets so polluted drilling has to stop.

I have read in several places that total pollution from developing and burning natural gas is about the same as from coal. That makes me wonder why the U.S. president is discouraging the use of coal, which

has been around for over a 100 years, and encouraging the development of natural gas with its new risks. Powers concludes that the U.S. cannot be self sufficient with natural gas for these reasons.

I will watch companies like Encana, a natural gas company.

I also own shares in Bonavista, which develops and produces oil, natural gas and related products.

GOLD PRICES I recently wrote that I expect the price of gold to stay low. About the time I sent the article in, the price of gold went up and stayed above its 50-day moving average. The price of gold might be a wild card.

Over the past 38 years, the price of gold, on average, has come down going into June, give or take a few weeks on either side. Unless something really is different this year, I would expect the price of gold to go up for a while and then get smacked down little by little as we head for June.

The price of gold can rally up very quickly, but the price can come down just as rapidly. From November 2012 to the middle of 2013, the price of gold got smacked down during the first week of each month as new labour stats came out in the U S on the first Friday of each month.

I will eagerly watch just how speculators treat the price of gold early in each month. Will the price of gold drop during that first week of each month and will it go up during the rest of the month more than it drops? Only time will tell.

I own shares in silver producer First Majestic mainly because it has four operating mines in silverfriendly Mexico, and silver is used in many gadgets and is too cheap to recycle, so it ends up in the garbage dump.

There are other silver producers. There is also a silver streamer Silver Wheaton (SLW) which lends money to companies with advanced mines and then takes silver as payments instead of money.

Franco Nevada (FNV) and Sandstorm (SSL) make deals with gold miners similar to the deals SLW makes with silver producers. I mention these because these stocks can let an investor be in the gold and silver sectors yet not own shares in the actual mines with all their risks. I ran some num-

bers — the price of FNV shares in late January was around $51 when gold was $1,260 as when the price of gold was 10 per cent higher. It looks like FNV is working out better for investors than Silver Wheaton.

The price of these streamers is linked very closely to the price of gold and silver, and as go the commodities so go the stocks most of the time. But the streamers don’t have the risk of owning equipment, manage thousands of employees, and they don’t need to spend money exploring for or buying gold and or silver to replace the stuff they have taken out of the ground.

SELLING CALLS ON GRAIN IN THE BIN Some farmers already sell calls to bring in cash and buy puts for downside price protection. For the past few years crop prices have been quite good — no reason to go

looking for more work and more cash. However, since grain and oil seed prices have dropped, I get calls from readers wondering how to sell calls on grain in the bin.

I know three outfits that help farmers do this. The Royal Bank in Winnipeg has people devoted to this strategy and the folks at P I Financial also do that for their customers. I think some staff at Cargill know this stuff too. Grain prices likely are not going to go up much in the next few months.

Collecting a premium from selling a call on some crop in the bin might be a way to bring in cash. Of course there also are cash advances on grain, and signs are that the interest free loan program will be popular this year. Readers who have learned how to sell covered calls on stocks should be able to move to grain quite easily.

Once you learn this strategy, you and your family can use this knowl-

edge for years to come on your crops and on stocks. Some critics say selling calls can limit gains and that is true in a bull market.

However in a flat to falling market, selling calls is a way to bring in cash from speculators. In my 10 years of experience with selling calls I have regretted not selling calls a lot more than selling them.

When you get the hang of the strategy you can look at using calls to boost cash flow from grain and stocks. Once you learn that, you can learn how to use puts to boost cash flow and to protect the value of your crop and stocks.

All of this sounds complicated and it is until your mind figures it out. Talk to me or to a crops expert and start learning. † Andy is mostly retired. He gardens, travels a bit with his wife, plays with granddaughters, looks after his investments and publishes an electronic newsletter called StocksTalk. You can read it free for a month by sending an email to sirski@mts.net.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

19

Columns MANAGEMENT MINUTE

Freddy Fullbins cuts trip short With a lot of grain on hand and little possibility of high-priced sales in the near future, Freddy Fullbins has a cash flow problem ANDREW DERUYCK

MARK SLOANE

W

e had a panicked call from one of our clients in late December. Freddy Fullbins had prided himself as a triple A farmer: April to August and then Arizona. But on Hole 12 during his 15th round Freddy received an alarming email from his son Freddy Junior back home.

The email said the local terminal had suspended wheat con-

tracts until the fall of 2014. The rumour that spread like wildfire was that the terminal had already sourced its entire handle given its anticipated rail access.

The Fullbins had an extraordinary crop in 2013 and although they had presold their token 25 per cent prior to harvest and marketed another 35 per cent off the field and with new deferred delivery contracts during harvest, they were still only about 60 per cent sold.

Fullbins’ farm is relatively high equity and cash flow hasn’t been a challenge on the farm the last couple of years with Fullbins taking advantage of pre-buy discounts on fertilizer, seed, and other crop inputs.

We work with Fullbins on an annual basis to develop production, cash flow and work on strategic planning. We met with Fullbins in early January to begin planning for 2014, and there were

no big surprises in his balance sheet. His working capital is more than adequate, representing 80 per cent of 2013 gross expenses.

We constructed the projection as we normally do — scaling in on grain sales eventually emptying the bins by August 1 or so and pre-selling 25 per cent of the 2014 crop in the fall to turn some bins.

Fullbins had an extraordinary crop in 2013 Everything cash flowed very nicely, however we had to face the potential reality: grain on hand may not get sold until it’s contracted and no contracts were currently available until October

2014. This creates the following challenges and risks: 1. $600,000 in grain inventory may not be sold and therefore that cash is not available for operations 2. If that grain can only be marketed starting next October, and the market price is below what Fullbins needs to cover his cost of production and fixed charges (rent, payments, taxes and personal drawings), should he sell?

3. Freddy Fullbins has enough storage on the farm for an average year and has used bags, piles or delivery to take care of any surplus above that.

His storage is currently 60 per cent full (meaning he may only have room for 40 per cent of an average crop). How will Fullbins store the 2014 crop?

CHALLENGE NO. 1 CASH FLOW SHORTAGE The good news long-term is that the working capital is still healthy on the farm but the liquidity has deteriorated, thus starving short-term cash flow.

The solution to this problem lies in any option to supplement cash availability or decrease cash requirement, hopefully without affecting profitability. We developed the following list.

• Withdraw funds from Fullbins’ AgriInvest account.

• With good inventory volumes, there is an opportunity to increase Fullbins’ cash advance under the Advance Payments Program.

• Contact creditors and request a postponement of principal payments (go onto interest only). This will bring the principal portion of the payments back into the cash flow.

• Delay capital purchases.

• Fullbins spent approximately $275,000 on equipment and building capital purchases in 2013 and funded those purchases with cash.

We identified that the farm can handle additional payments and therefore suggested he term out these recent purchases • Sell non-essential term assets such as the UTV he won from New Holland this fall (Lucky #$&%$).

• Proactively negotiate additional trade credit or perhaps extended terms.

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• Term out existing line of credit and any accounts payable, while taking care not to exceed the capacity of the farm to handle payments. The last five years have demonstrated excellent repayment potential and current land values help to support security for such borrowing.

• Downsizing is an option.

Dropping some of the rented land could help to solve the cash requirement and the grain storage issue.

• Seek additional investors.

This could mean investments into his business, or selling land to another individual or company for an agreed upon price with an option included to purchase the land back at some point in time with agreed upon returns.

CHALLENGE NO. 2 SELLING BELOW COST Earliest grain sales may only start in October, 2014. If prices are below what Fullbins needs to cover cost of production and fixed charges, does it make sense to sell?

This decision will be influenced by two things: cash flow and risk appetite in grain markets. If cash flow dictates that cash needs to come from grain sales, Fullbins should make a concerted effort to source the best grade, specs, basis and delivery. He should do this sooner rather than later, to ensure that a lack of cash does not hamper his operations.

If the cash flow projection indicates that cash is not required and no high priced trade credit is used (18 per cent) then the decision of whether to sell at a low price is based on pure market intelligence and risk appetite. It’s important for each farm business to clearly understand their opportunity cost when it comes to sourcing cash. If the cost of trade credit increases, the potential reward from the market must be adjusted as well.

CHALLENGE NO. 3 STORAGE SPACE This challenge will require proactive decision-making. For now, Freddy Fullbins needs to assume he will have an average crop in 2014, so he’d better source the additional infrastructure — bins or bags — sooner rather than later. Availability will be an issue unless something changes. It may also be an option to elect to grow crops that will either offer a beneficial delivery opportunity or crops with lower yield volumes.

The good news is that Freddy’s golf game went downhill in December and his wife really wasn’t looking forward to that Barrett-Jackson sale anyway. † Andrew DeRuyck and Mark Sloane manage two farming operations in southern Manitoba and are partners in Right Choice Management Consulting.

With over 25 years of cumulative experience, they offer support in farm management, financial management, strategic planning and mediation services. They can be reached at andrewd@ goinet.ca and sloanefarms@hotmail.com or 204825-7392 and 204-825-8443.

20

/ grainews.ca

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Columns APP QUEST

Air Cart maximizer

Beyond Agronomy’s new Air Cart Maximizer app JAY PETERSON

T

© 2013 The Mosaic Company. All rights reserved. Fusion is a trademark and MicroEssentials is a registered trademark of The Mosaic Company. MES-0595

This app from Beyond Agronomy can help you maximize efficiency with your air cart this spring.

hough it is still winter, thoughts are starting to turn to springtime and seeding. Soil tests are being analyzed and fertilizer is being bought for acres that are pencilled in. This always brings up the question of how to get the most out of your air cart. If you can reduce your day by one or even half a fill, you can increase your productivity.

Beyond Agronomy has an app out there to help you maximizing your air cart.

THE APP The main page is easy to navigate — it asks you to select how many tanks your air cart has. The next page asks for your tank capacities. It also asks your fertilizer and seeding rates in pounds per acre. Once you have entered your information just press “calculate” and it takes you directly to the results page.

On this page, your lbs./ac. requirements are presented in column form. It lists the seed and fertilizer at the top and the tanks down the left side. You will notice that often it breaks down the rates over multiple tanks with a split rate.

If you want, you can do the math and figure out if a split rate is the same as just using those

tanks at full rate one by one instead of having them all running at once. At the bottom you can see the maximum acres you can get out of each fill with this set up and rates. There is also a metric conversion button at the bottom to change your maximum area between acres and hectares.

As you can see it is a pretty simple in and out app.

THE DETAILS One of the biggest issues with this app it that it only has one spot to input fertilizer. Lots of farmers are using two fertilizer blends at once during seeding for things like double shoot or midrow banding.

There are a couple of solutions to this problem that do not require too much extra work. The first is to just tell it you are going to use certain tanks for seed and others for fertilizer. Then select the tanks you’re using for fertilizer, enter the information, but instead of seed enter the rate for your second fertilizer.

It is a pretty simple in and out app

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I prefer using the blend of fertilizer that is going on at the lower rate as the seed entry. This scenario works best for an oilseed, where you know you are using your smallest tank or second smallest tank for seed no matter what because the fertilizer is going to run out multiple times before the seed.

The second way around this problem takes one more step than usual.

First, enter in all your information as you usually would, except when you get to the fertilizer section add up the multiple rates and enter it as one. If you were applying two rates at 90 lbs./ac. and 50 lbs./ac., input these as one rate of 140 lbs./ac.

This will give you the most efficient placement of your fertilizer. Now all you have to do is go back and input only the fertilizer tanks giving you the most efficient distribution of fertilizer, since your seed tank is known as in the above example. I have done this multiple times with some different rates and I can get it to work out within 10 acres of maximum efficiency.

You might be questioning this because of the density difference between fertilizer and seed. If you like, you can change the rate you are inputting based on the percentage difference between the fertilizer and the seed density, which should give you a slightly more accurate output. Once you get familiar with this app you can quickly play around with these numbers to find a solution that you feel works best for your equipment and your target rates of seed and fertilizer.

This app is available not only for Apple products but Android as well. All in all, it’s a great little app that hopefully will help you with your spring time efficiencies. † Cost: $4.99 Jay Peterson farms near Frontier, Sask.

123 N. Third Street

Suite 400

Minneapolis, MN 55401

P: 612-623-8000

www.broadheadco.com

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

21

Columns UNDERSTANDING MARKET BULLS AND BEARS

Word on the circuit After a winter of ag meetings and presentations, Brian Wittal is armed with information and advice BRIAN WITTAL

E

very year from November to March the ag industry is a buzz with trade shows, conferences, conventions, AGM’s and producer meetings in an effort to promote and sell products and equipment and review and discuss topics of interest such as agronomy, research and marketing.

I have been able to attend a number of these events this winter and there are a few more I plan to attend.

Some as a speaker, but most often as a participant listening to both the experts giving presentations and those listening along side me.

The part I find the most interesting is the discussion at the coffee break and the meals. Don’t get me wrong, the information being presented is good, accurate and interesting but it is the reaction, discussion and questions after the presentation that I find most interesting.

How could these markets change so fast? What’s happening out there?

How can fertilizer and chemical prices go up when grain prices are going down?

I can’t cover my costs of production at these prices. How do they expect me to make a living?

How can land prices keep going up? I can’t afford to expand.

With today’s technology I have also been able to attend many webinar presentations this year where world renowned experts talked about world economies, population growth and supply and demand for foodstuffs and so on.

These discussions and information are useful and relevant in helping me to see the world picture and how western Canadian agriculture fits into that picture so I can give better advice to my farm clients.

In one webcast a presenter commented that it’s not the years of low commodity prices that do farmers in, but rather it’s the decisions made in the years of high prices that end up being the undoing of those farms. I found this to be a very thought provoking and profound statement Armed with this new knowledge and understanding of the world picture let me try to address some of those questions I was getting from fellow meeting participants.

THE MARKETS It’s all about world supply and demand numbers. You may not believe them, but once those numbers are out, world trade moves forward based on the numbers. Two consecutive bumper crops worldwide change the numbers fast.

The harsh reality is that the world markets do not care about your costs of production. If it can be bought cheaper elsewhere, that’s where they will buy it.

Commodity markets are intertwined these days. Fertilizer prices are driven by input costs. For nitrogen fertilizer a major input is natural gas. This winter in North America has been colder

than usual which has pushed up the demand and the price for natural gas.

If fertilizer producers want to make nitrogen fertilizer they need to pay market price for the gas and that pushes up the price of the fertilizer, regardless of grain prices or your costs of production.

North American land prices continue to climb for a couple of reasons. In the U.S. retirees and investors are putting their money back into land, seeing it as a safe investment.

The record price in Iowa this past year was $21,000 per acre.

Record high grain prices over the past two years have prompted farmers to be aggressive with

expansion plans, and high grain prices made it easy to justify paying more for land. Land prices usually follow grain prices but with about a one year lag. So many producers have either bought high priced land or made rental agreements at rates that reflected the higher grain prices of the past two years that, with lower grain prices, it is going to be a struggle for them to break even.

THE WORLD PICTURE We are in the midst of a huge shift that started over 10 years ago.

Economic growth and demand is moving from developed nations (North America, Europe, Japan

and others) to emerging nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, Korea and others). Population growth in developed nations ranges from zero to three per cent annually, while in the emerging nations we are seeing growth rates of three to 10 per cent. Over 50 per cent of the worlds population growth over the next 10 years will come from emerging nations. Demand for foodstuffs is growing exponentially in the BRICK nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China and Korea).

Canada is a primary exporter of agriculture goods. Our cost of living and costs of production continue to increase as our standard of living continues to mature. To afford our standard of living we must generate more profit, by producing more units or getting a higher price for what we produce. Since farmers can’t control prices, all they can do is produce more units to generate additional revenue to sustain their operations. To this point Canadian farmers have been very

successful (to their own detriment) as the bumper crop this year has proven.

Now that we’re producing more to meet increasing demand, where’s the problem? There are a few issues at play here.

First is the issue of affordability.

Forty-seven per cent of the world’s population lives on less than $2 a day.

Governments of emerging nations cannot afford to feed all of their starving masses so they subsidize to encourage more local production. The cost to produce a bushel of grain on a subsistence farm in China is lower than it is in Western Canada. The more they produce locally the less they need to import, which reduces demand and lowers prices for western Canadian farmers.

I’ll continue with this topic in the next issue. † Brian Wittal has 30 years of grain industry experience, and currently offers market planning and marketing advice to farmers through his company Pro Com Marketing Ltd. (www.procommarketingltd.com).

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Features CROP PRODUCTION

WILD OATS A MYSTERY

CROP ADVISOR’S CASEBOOK

BY AUDREY BAMBER

I

received a call last July from John, the owner of a dry land farm near Medicine Hat, Alta., that grows mostly wheat. John’s wheat crop had just headed out, and he was having a problem with wild oats despite his use of an in-crop herbicide.

“I don’t think the herbicide worked. The wild oats are lush and healthy, and seem unaffected by the herbicide I applied in June,” John said, sounding quite discouraged.

When I arrived at John’s farm, he took me into the affected field where I saw exactly what he meant — large patches of very healthy wild oats were mixed among his standing wheat. They did indeed appear unaffected by the herbicide application a month earlier.

I asked John what herbicide he used, when it was applied and how much water was used during application. I also asked if the crop had been under any stress such as drought, heat or flooding.

John informed he had used clodinafop, a Group 1 herbicide for the post-emergence control of grasses in wheat that is absorbed through the leaves. For this product to be effective, it must be applied during the oneto six-leaf stage. John assured me that the herbicide had been applied at the right rate, time and conditions.

He also didn’t believe the crop had been under stress, and he could not understand why the herbicide hadn’t worked. John said he’d been using it for years on the wheat crops on his land,

Left: Audrey Bamber is with Richardson Pioneer Ltd. at Dunmore, Alta. Right: Even after herbicide application, large patches of very healthy wild oats were mixed among the standing wheat. and this particular field had been in a long-term fallow wheat rotation. If the herbicide had been applied at the right rate, time and conditions, then what could explain the wild oats escapes?

If you think you know what’s behind John’s wild oat problem, send your diagnosis to Grainews, Box 9800, Winnipeg, Man., R3C 3K7; email leeann. minogue@fbcpublishing.com or fax 204-944-95416 c/o Crop Advisor’s Casebook. Best suggestions will be pooled and one winner will be drawn for a chance to win a Grainews cap and a one-year subscription to the magazine. The answer, along with reasoning that

CASEBOOK WINNER

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he winner for this issue is Shawn Stewart, from Splendron Farms at Vankleek Hill, Ontario.

Thanks for entering, Shawn!

We’ll be renewing your Grainews subscription for a year and sending you a Grainews cap. † Leeann Minogue

solved the mystery, will appear in the next Crop Advisor’s Solution File. † Audrey Bamber is a sales agronomist with Richardson Pioneer Ltd. at Dunmore, Alta.

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CROP ADVISOR’S SOLUTION HIGH SOIL SALINITY RESPONSIBLE FOR PATCHY WHEAT

BY LIZ SAMPSON

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ave, a wheat farmer near Chipman, Alta., called me shortly after the 2013 fall harvest to tell me about a problem with his wheat. He was concerned about patchy areas of his field, where the crop had come in about a foot shorter than the wheat in the rest of the field.

“The head size, though, was very similar — it was the straw itself that was short,” Dave said.

He added that the taller crop had matured faster and was a brighter yellow that the shorter crop, and that it had been six to eight weeks into the growing season when the symptoms first started showing up.

When I came to visit Dave’s farm, I had a close look at the wheat stubble left over from harvest. I could see some differences in colour as well as size, such as thinner stalks, in the stubble in the affected patches, which were large and still held some water, even though they weren’t located in the low parts of the field.

Dave thought a nutrient deficiency might be to blame — it had been four years since he’d last “sludged,” or fertilized the field using raw manure. He also thought a chemical carryover could be responsible, because the year prior there had been very poor germination in the field, prompting Dave to use a burn-off chemical to kill off the crop and start fresh.

Dave had good reason to think a nutrient problem or chemical carryover could be responsible, but that didn’t explain why the problem was occurring in patches. And why were the affected patches holding water when they weren’t in low-lying areas of the field? Were the two problems connected?

I know the area quite well and had come across numerous fields with solonetzic soils — that is, soils with high levels of naturally occurring sodium.

When I saw the soil type of Dave’s field and the nature of the patches, I began to suspect that sodium was the culprit.

We tested the soil from both the affected and non-affected areas, and sure enough, the patchy areas exhibited high soil salinity — above 400 parts per million of sodium — and a high electrical conductivity value in the subsoil, which can result in significant yield loss if the soil isn’t managed appropriately. This also explained why the patchy parts of the field were retaining water.

I believed there was likely a hardpan layer with high salinity about eight inches down that could be susceptible to compaction from tillage, so I suggested that Dave limit or eliminate tillage in the field.

I also urged him to increase potash levels and be wary of over-fertilizing (sludging can cause major nutrient and acidity issues in a field).

All of these measures should work to allow some deep soil water movement that will remove some of that salt out of the root zone. I suggested that in the meantime, Dave could put some more tolerant alfalfa or grass mix into the field for a few years. Installing tile drains could also potentially help move salts and sodium out of the soil as well, but would require further research into the return on such a high investment.

I also emphasized the need to test the soil. It’s important to know what kinds of soils you are dealing with and manage them to maximize their potential, as opposed to just focusing on yield goals.

Dave will likely fertilize appropriately next year so he can get the most out of the less productive areas of the field. “It’s a relief to know what’s going on in the field, and now I can manage accordingly,” he told me. † Liz Simpson is a regional sales agronomist with Richardson International in Nampa, Alta.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Machinery & Shop Tillage

A new spin on mud scrapers A Manitoba farmer has come up with a tool that will keep mud from building up on packer wheels

By Lee Hart

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ordon Sharp of Riceton, Sask. and Henning Wubbe of La Riviere, Man. have completely different soil conditions, but both say any tool that can keep mud from building up on packer wheels at seeding is almost worth its weight in gold.

Both grain and oilseed producers have become solid believers in the Devloo Roto Mud Scapers they attached to their respective seeding systems over the past couple years. The scrapers, developed about four years ago by Manitoba farmer Mark Devloo, can make the difference between whether these farmers can seed or have to wait two or three days for conditions to dry out.

“I have been really impressed with how well the scrapers have worked,” says Sharp, who farms on soil commonly referred to as Regina gumbo, just southeast of the provincial capital. “I had people tell me that no scraper would work in these soils, but these roto scrapers do a great job of keeping the wheels clean.”

In southern Manitoba, Henning Wubbe crops about 4,200 acres of mostly sandy-clay type soil.

With the right or wrong conditions, depending on perspective, he says it wasn’t uncommon for mud build up on the air drill tires to lift the whole machine out of the ground. “And you can imagine what impact that has on seed placement,” says Wubbe. “I have been really happy with these scrapers. Even when conditions were a bit wet, as long as we could go with the tractor we could seed the crop and keep the seed where we wanted it.”

Top: Devloo says being able to keep the packer wheels free of mud allows him to be seeding at least two or three days earlier. Left: Devloo has a wide range of mounting brackets, and brackets can be custom made to fit specific situations.

Mark Devloo Devloo who himself farms with family members at Somerset, Manitoba says being able to keep the packer wheels free of mud allows him to be seeding at least two or three days earlier and that translates into being able to harvest crops earlier too.

“We like to be seeding as early as we can in the spring,” says Devloo, who developed the scrapers initially to cope with his own field conditions. “And it is not even the real wet conditions that are the problem. The problem develops on fields that may appear dry on top but as soon as you disturb that you expose this half wet, sticky type of soil that just clings to the wheels. So I wanted some simple, low maintenance scraper that could keep mud off the wheels.”

Working with an idea originally suggested by his dad, Jerry Devloo, Mark got busy designing and testing different prototypes.

It took some trial and error with on-farm research and development, but he finally came up with this cup-shaped scraper that can be mounted just above the packer wheels. The scrapers not only allow him to be

on fields sooner, but he says at harvest having that few days of earlier crop maturity also help him to beat the fall frost.

The Devloo Roto Mud Scraper was something he developed for his own John Deere 730 cultivator for seeding, but recognizing other farmers could use it too, he has gone on during the past 18 months to sell about 15,000 of the scrapers across Western Canada and even into Australia and New Zealand. The invention that has won innovation awards at Canada’s Farm Progress Show in Regina,Sask.; Manitoba Ag Days in Brandon,Man.; as well as the Agri-Trade Show in Red Deer, Alta. was introduced to European farmers at the world’s largest Agritechnica Farm Show in Germany in late 2013.

Devloo realized there were rigid bar-type mud scrapers on the market but he wanted something different that had less

wear. He came up with this cup or cone-shaped scraper, with a bearing on top. With a simple bracket it can be mounted just above the packer wheel.

“The idea is to have the cup mounted about a quarter inch above the wheel and just off to the side,” says Devloo. “And the cup can turn. It doesn’t move unless it comes in contact with mud on the wheel, but as soon as it does it turns and because it’s using the full circumference edge of the cup there is a lot less friction and less wear. A lot of these scrapers have been used two or three years and they still have the original paint.”

The roto scraper will work on any packer wheel and Devloo has designed a wide range of brackets that work with almost any make and model of drill.

The scraper itself is laser cut from 1023 carbon steel, with a durable NTN 6203 motor grade bearing. And as Henning

Wubbe discovered any problem is quickly corrected.

He tried the Devloo scrapers for the first time in the spring of 2013 on a new John Deere 1830 hoe drill. That drill came equipped with bar type scrapers over the packer wheels. On a previous drill he had built his own bar scrapers to keep mud off the wheels that carried the main frame of the drill. He wanted to give the roto scapers a try on the new drill.

“The first brackets we tried were a bit difficult to install and then we found the bracket itself was causing a problem with mud, so we contacted Devloo and explained the problem,” says Wubbe. “Within about two hours he was at the farm with a different style of bracket and that worked fine. As it happened we had a rain delay for a couple days, and before we started again Devloo was back to the farm with a complete set of brackets that were quickly installed and we were able to get going. That was pretty good customer service.”

Gordon Sharp, who crops about 4,500 acres of wheat, canola and lentils, bought one of the first set of roto scrapers in 2011. He is using a K-Hart double disc drill with packer wheels.

“We had three or four wet years starting in 2010,” says Sharp.

“When that gumbo gets sticky it just plugs everything up, so we

just had to quit and wait for the fields to dry.”

“I think we bought only the second set of these scrapers and there were no mounting brackets available at the time, so we made our own,” he says. “We actually took one of the packer wheel assemblies off and mounted it on a quad and then tried some different brackets designs until found one that worked, and we ran that quad through every wet spot we could find, and the scraper worked fine.”

With the scrapers mounted on the K-Hart drill he’s able to operate even under sticky soil conditions without mud balling up on the tires and without pulling the openers or seed back out of the ground. “The scrapers keep the mud off the packer wheels and so far they show no sign of wear,” says Sharp. “And we’re able to be out seeding two or three days earlier than we would without scrapers.”

Devloo says the scrapers will work with virtually all makes and models of seeding equipment.

He has a wide range of mounting brackets, and brackets can be custom made to fit specific situations. For more information on the Devloo Roto Mud Scrapers visit the product website at: rotomudscrapers.com. † Lee Hart is a field editor for Grainews in Calgary. Contact him at 403-592-1964 or by email at lee@fbcpublishing.com.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Machinery & Shop Agritechnica coverage

Turning tire design on its ear A revolutionary new concept in ag tires may be the most significant redesign to the pneumatic tire since it was invented

By Scott Garvey

“

photo: scott garvey

This Unimog equipped with PneuTrac tires runs a slalom course to demonstrate the lateral stability of the PneuTrac design.

T

ire or track,” asks Mitas’ promotional material announcing the completely new PneuTrac ag tire. It seems like a fair question given how odd this tire looks, and how differently it performs when mounted on a rim. Tire manufacturer Mitas chose to introduce the prototype PneuTrac concept to the

public at November’s Agritechnica in Hanover, Germany. While it isn’t yet market-ready, it was definitely turning heads at the show.

“This concept shows that we are thinking outside the box of current tire-producing practices with a strong focus on what will benefit farmers,” said Andrew Mabin, Mitas’ sales and marketing director, in a press release.

“We still have some way to go to

As a farmer, I expect…  10-section automatic overlap control that saves money by eliminating double seed and fertilizer application.

 Knowledgeable support staff who can trouble-shoot remotely via my in-cab monitor while I am in the field.

 Gentle metering and distribution that lets me reduce seeding rates while maintaining target plant populations.

 To apply granular fertilizer at rates of up to 400 lbs/acre on my 100’ drill with no plugging.

 Hydraulic, ground-following openers  Variable rate capability for up to five that give me uniform seed and fertilizer products at one time. placement, excellent emergence,  A ruggedly reliable system that can strong growth and even maturity. seed thousands of acres with no  Stress-free, in-cab automatic calibration breakdowns and minimal maintenance. that’s based on actual product usage  A light-pulling drill with a lift-kit that thanks to weigh cells on each tank and seeds through muddy fields without a user-friendly monitor. getting stuck.

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bring the concept into a commercial product, but the initial results look very promising, challenging the design of the conventional tire and cost of tracks.”

The PneuTrac concept was actually developed by Galileo Wheel Ltd., of Israel, who is partnering with Mitas to turn the concept into a commerciallyavailable product.

“The basic concept is we are approaching the carcass, or tire design, in a different way,” said Avishay Novoplanski, founder of Galileo Wheel Ltd., and inventor of the PneuTrac. “In all existing tires, the carcass is a U shape revolved around the rim. As the tire works, the sidewall is deflecting. The (standard) tire tries to follow the contour of the ground and increase its footprint, and it can do that to some extent. But if you deflate it too much, the footprint buckles in the centre (of the tread).

With this (PneuTrac) design, the sidewall is kind of a V shape, like an accordion. All the vertical load is carried only by the air, not by the carcass.”

The footprint of the PneuTrac is significantly larger than that of a standard tire of equal size, providing up to 53 per cent more ground-contact area according to Mitas. That increases traction and improves power transfer to the ground, boosting tractive power by up to 48 per cent, the company adds. The increased footprint is significantly elongated compared to standard tires, something the company refers to as a “track effect.” And it gives the tire a flatbottomed appearance when it’s mounted on a vehicle.

Because that load is distributed evenly across the tread face by the internal inflation pressure, the ground pressure it exerts is evenly distributed across the entire surface. That provides an advantage over tracks, which have higher point loads on the track under the bogie wheels.

“It’s a standard pneumatic tire and you’d like to keep some air pressure to evenly distribute the load, yet you could go with no air pressure at all,” Novoplanski said.

“We conducted some tests with our nominal air pressure, which in that case was 0.8 (Bar, about 11 p.s.i.). Then just for the sake of it we finished it with zero air pressure. It was functioning very well with no air at all.”

So if you lose air pressure, you won’t end up with a flat, as you would with a normal tire.

“If something happens in the middle of a row, you could certainly finish the row, probably finish the day,” he explained. “So you’re not stuck (with a flat).”

But when looking at the highly deflected tire, it seems to be ready to slip off the rim or have no lateral stability at all in a corner.

The reality is exactly the opposite, according to Novoplanski.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

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Machinery & Shop “Those tires actually have grater lateral stability with no air pressure at all than normal tires inflated to their nominal pressure,” he said. “That allows very high deflection at very low pressure, still maintaining great steering and manoeuvrability without creating heat or damaging the tire.”

“You can work in the field with very low pressure and very high deflection since the relation between the internal pressure of the tire and ground pressure might be slightly different than a standard tire. The physics are the same, of course, but the mechanics are different.”

The PneuTrac design is also less likely to suffer damage from field hazards, because its sidewall isn’t exposed beyond the tread, so it’s protected from puncture hazards.

If an ordinary tire has a punctured sidewall, it likely means the tire is finished. The PneuTrac on the other hand has a much thicker sidewall than a normal tire, and it can be repaired in the unlikely event it does get damaged.

“In ag applications you go with very low pressure, so the sidewalls (of conventional tires) tend to bulge out,” Novoplanski explained. “What is bulging out is the thinnest and weakest part of the tire. With this (PneuTrac) tire, it won’t bulge out, so it is less likely something will hit the sidewall.”

The PneuTrac will also fit on any standard rim for a comparable tire size.

PHOTOS: GALILEO-MOBILITY.COM

Although the tire isn’t yet in production and firm pricing hasn’t been set, Novoplanski thinks it will likely have a little higher retail cost than a standard tire when it does hit the market. “There is more sidewall here so there is more material, which means more cost,” he said. “But by all means when you compare the additional costs to the additional advantages, it’s a very clear answer.”

“It is a standard pneumatic tire; it’s round and it’s black,” Novoplanski continued, summing things up. “It’s manufactured in a standard facility from the same moulds, yet it is totally different in its structure and physics. It will take years — but not many years — and it will be in the market.”

For a video look at the PneuTrac tire, visit grainews.ca/videos online. † Scott Garvey is machinery editor for Grainews.

Contact him at Scott.Garvey@fbcpublishing.com.

PHOTO: SCOTT GARVEY

Top left: When mounted on a machine, the PneuTrac tire provides a much longer footprint and more lateral stability than typical tire designs. Top right: The PneuTrac concept tire introduced at Agritechnica has a unique carcass design, with a V-shaped sidewall that bows in rather than bulge outward like a standard pneumatic tire.

Bottom: Avishay Novoplanski, inventor of the PneuTrac tire said it will be market ready within a few years and will provide significant advantages that will outweigh any extra purchase costs.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Machinery & Shop Project CJ3A

We find more front axle problems This time a leaking gasket and another broken stud mean we need to spend more time on the axle overhaul before its ready for reinstallation

By Scott Garvey

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n the last progress report on Project CJ3A, we removed a broken stud in the frontaxle steering knuckle. After tearing down the rest of axle, we found yet another broken stud.

This time it was one of the bolts holding the differential housing cover plate on.

The gasket sealing the cover plate to the axle housing was leaking like a sieve before we tore down the old Jeep. After removing the cover plate, the reason was clear. Someone had removed it before and used silicone sealant to form a new gasket. That had deteriorated.

Making matters worse was the broken stud, which meant the plate couldn’t be snugged up to the housing properly.

After scraping the remaining silicone off the axle mounting surface, there was still a lot of rust

remaining. In order to get the plate to seal again, all that corrosion and crud needed to come off too. Using a sanding block and 400-grit paper, we sanded the surface until we had it shiny and smooth again.

But there was yet another problem to deal with. At some point the axle must have struck something solid, and some metal from the housing was protruding above the mounting surface, which would hold the cover plate away from the mounting surface at that spot. Using a fine-tooth hand file, we attacked that protruding lip and worked it down until it was smooth with the mounting surface.

But there was still the broken stud to deal with. In our last instalment, we welded a nut onto the protruding portion of that broken bolt in order to twist it out. But this time, the stud was broken flush with the

housing, so that tactic wouldn’t work here.

Instead, we pulled the set of stud extractors, commonly referred to as easy outs, from our tool box.

The first step in removing a broken bolt with this type of tool is getting a relatively smooth surface to work with. That meant sanding the broken, jagged end of the bolt down to a flat surface — or as flat as we could get this one. Part of it was broken below the level of the mounting surface.

To smoothen it out, we put an 80-grit sanding pad on a dualaction sander and carefully worked protruding chunk until it was smooth with the housing surface.

Then, using a centre punch, we marked a starting point for a drill bit as close to the centre of the broken bolt as we could eyeball it.

(Getting that right is important to prevent damage to the threads in the axle housing).

Then, we drilled a pilot hole

1

right through the centre of the broken stud. Next, we selected the widest drill bit we thought we could safely use without drilling outside the bolt and damaging the hole’s threads.

The broken stud was in a threaded hole that went right through the axle housing, so we were able to apply penetrating fluid from both ends to help free it up.

Now it was time for the extractor. Drilling the largest hole feasible allowed us to select the thickest, and therefore strongest, extractor that would fit. This part calls for a bit of a tender touch.

The extractors are made from hardened steel, but they’re still relatively thin. They can, and will, break if you twist too hard.

Trust me on this. I speak from experience. If you do break one off in place, you’ll end up with a broken hardened-steel stud inside a broken mild-steel stud stuck in

a mild-steel housing. Drilling that out is something you may want to trust to a machine shop, which means added cost and delay.

Even after applying a little heat, this stud wouldn’t budge. Rather than press our luck and risk breaking the extractor, we opted to simply leave things as they were for a while. We continued applying penetrating fluid over several hours and then let the piece sit overnight. Patience is a virtue with this job.

The next day, we applied more heat and more fluid. Eventually, the heat and fluid did their jobs and the stud turned free with a gentle twist. Then, we were able to easily back it out.

With a new gasket in place and the backing plate back on, the axle is now ready to be mounted back on the chassis and fully reassembled. † Scott Garvey is machinery editor for Grainews.

Contact him at Scott.Garvey@fbcpublishing.com.

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photos: scott garvey

1: After removing the cover plate, it was clear moisture had been getting under it for a long time. The silicone sealant used instead of a regular gasket during a previous removal had failed and was allowing gear oil to leak out. We needed to remove the corrosion on the axle’s mating surface before attempting to reseal the unit. 2: After scraping the silicone off and sanding the surface smooth, it can now seal to a new gasket — once the broken stud is removed. 3: This is the sanding block we used. It’s holding 400-grit sandpaper. We covered the gears to prevent grit from falling in while we were working. 4: Before we can reinstall the cover plate, we have to remove yet another broken bolt. This one snapped flush with the mating surface, so we need to drill it and try removing it with a stud extractor tool. 5: After sanding the exposed end of the broken stud as smooth as possible, we drilled a hole through it and inserted the extractor. After several soakings of penetrating fluid and applying a little heat, the broken piece released when we put a wrench to it. 6: Here’s what we removed. You can see the extractor still in place through the centre of the broken stud. 7: A stud extractor (easy out) kit with several different sizes. Select the largest one possible for the broken piece you’re trying to remove. An adjustable wrench works well for turning them. It’s a larger wrench that can close its jaws on the small, square end of the extractor.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

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Machinery & Shop SHOP CLASS

Dolly improves shop organization Building a dedicated dolly to hold heavy components can help maximize available shop space

BY SCOTT GARVEY

T

he trouble with working on long-term mechanical projects in the farm workshop is they often interfere with the day-to-day jobs that need to roll in and out the doors. The large components removed from a big project can tie up a lot of floor space, and it seems the spot you chose to place them almost always ends up being in the way when working on other things, especially if you’ll be working on that project machine for a few months.

Constantly moving heavy components wastes a lot time and effort. But spending a little time beforehand to fabricate a dolly for them can be the answer to maximizing floor space in the shop. Having the ability to easily move parts around makes it easier bring in other machines for regular maintenance or quick repairs before you’re ready to bolt your long-term project back together.

The cost of materials is around $40 When we removed the engine, transmission and transfer case from Project CJ3A, there was no good spot to place it so it wouldn’t be in the way when other jobs need attention.

Because we knew the CJ3A restoration would take several months to complete and floor space in the shop was limited, we spent a little time and fabricated a dolly that would accept the engine assembly and allow us to jockey it around as needed. That kept it out of the way and made it easy to bring it back close to the CJ3A chassis when we were ready to reinstall it.

We measured the distance between mounting points on the engine and transmission and built the dolly to match them, opting for the simplest design possible to save time and materials but still not risk damaging anything.

In all, we used about 10 feet of two-inch square tubing to fabricate a simple frame then drilled holes in all four corners to accept castor wheels, each rated for 250 pound loads. That capacity rating was ample for our needs. Next, we sprayed a little rust-inhibiting paint on it so we didn’t have to look at an ugly, rusted piece of steel.

The steel and castor wheels were already lying around the shop; but overall, the cost of materials is around $40, and it took about one and a half hours to build and paint. Now, the engine assembly can easily be moved whenever necessary. It’s proven to be time and money well spent.

At the end of this project, the dolly can be modified or repurposed for another task. † Scott Garvey is machinery editor for Grainews.

Contact him at Scott.Garvey@fbcpublishing.com.

PHOTOS: SCOTT GARVEY

Left: This simple dolly, made of 2-inch square tubing and inexpensive castors, was built specifically to hold an engine and transmission assembly that will be kicking around the shop for a few months. Right: The dolly makes it easy to move the engine assembly around the shop and keep it out of the way when working on other projects.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Cattleman’s Corner REPRODUCTIVE PERFORMANCE

Cold hard facts on protecting bull fertility HEATHER SMITH THOMAS

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crotal frostbite can temporarily or permanently affect bull fertility, depending upon severity. Albert Barth, recently retired professor at Western College of Veterinary Medicine (WCVM), University of Saskatchewan, participated in a study looking at factors affecting breeding soundness of beef bulls.

He and researcher Cheryl Waldner looked at breeding soundness evaluation records from 2,110 beef bulls examined at the WCVM from 1986 through 1999. The effect of frostbite was one of the factors considered.

Most frostbite cases occurred December through February.

Bulls with mild frostbite at the base of the scrotum were not adversely affected as far as semen quality was concerned, but bulls with severe frostbite (one or more scabs greater than 3/4 inch in diametre) had much lower semen quality.

There were 58 bulls with large frostbite scabs on the base of their scrotum that were visible from January through June. None of those bulls had satisfactory semen quality January through March.

By April only nine per cent had satisfactory semen quality. About half of the bulls tested later recovered (with satisfactory semen) by May and June. Some bulls were permanently infertile.

AGE IS A FACTOR None of the yearling bulls suffered frostbite, but as age increased the frequency of frostbite increased significantly. For instance, bulls

five and six years of age were more likely to have frostbite than twoyear-olds.

“A more recent study evaluated bulls from two wintering stations 50 miles apart,” says Barth. “We normally go to those stations every year to test bulls. One has nice facilities for the bulls, with sheds and windbreaks. They use 20 per cent porosity (openings) fences that provide quite a bit of wind protection.”

The second station was a contrast, he says. The bulls are wintered more in the open. They have some willows for shelter but no bedding and usually lay in the snow. “Those bulls are more exposed to the wind and cold,” says Barth.

The research says the difference in semen quality between the two herds is significant. “For example, two springs ago at the first station 80.5 per cent of bulls had satisfactory semen,” says Barth. “In the two-year-old group, 21 out of 22 bulls passed their breeding soundness evaluation with good semen. Those young bulls were better looked after than the older bulls. In the second station, only 69.7 per cent of the bulls passed.

Last spring (2013) it was a similar picture.

At the second station only 67.9 per cent of bulls passed while bulls at the first station were still in the 80 per cent range.”

Frostbite was classified in a range from mild to significant (severe). At the first station 7.3 per cent of bulls showed evidence of mild frostbite and only 2.4 per cent had significant frostbite. The second station had 15.2 per cent with mild frostbite and three per cent with significant frostbite.

“By April testing, most of the bulls with mild frostbite had recovered and would be all right

PHOTOS: COURTESY WCVM AND HEATHER SMITH THOMAS

These photos illustrate what damage frostbite can do to a breeding bull. At left, is a fairly mild case of frostbite to a bull’s scrotum, while at right, is a severe case showing a large area of damaged tissue. for breeding season, compared to the longer-term damage of severe frostbite. Those bulls generally miss that breeding season. It may take them until July to recover. If adhesions form between the scrotum and testes the damage is permanent and they will never be fertile.”

PLAY IT COOL Adhesions hinder the bull’s ability to raise and lower the testicles for proper thermal regulation.

“The bull has to be able to raise and lower his testicles to keep them at the proper temperature for sperm production,” says Barth. Ideal temperature for sperm production is a few degrees cooler than body temperature.

This is why the testes hang down in the scrotum, away from the body. They hang even lower in hot weather, and can be pulled up close to the body for warmth during cold weather.

“The testes are also the least

well-oxygenated of all body tissues,” he say. “If you heat the testes even one degree, you increase the metabolic rate enough that the testes become short on oxygen. With most tissues, if you heat them you also get an increase in circulation and extra oxygen. But in the testes there is no corresponding increase in blood flow. There is more demand for oxygen by the warmer tissue because of the increase in metabolic rate but no increase in blood flow. This is damaging and results in abnormal sperm production.”

Inflammation (and heat) occurs after the freezing. “This interferes with cooling of the testes because the scrotum becomes hot from inflammation,” he says. Heat is damaging to sperm production.

As long as there are still red areas around the scab, there is some inflammation and the bull won’t have good semen. Once the scabs are drying up and there

is no more redness or pink colour left, the inflammation has subsided.

“Frostbite lesions are very visible,” says Barth. “Many bulls have small scabs about the size of a nickel or smaller but those are not a problem. The frostbite is minor and any adverse affect would be superficial and temporary. Those bulls will be recovered by breeding season. The biggest concern is the bulls with deeper, larger lesions.

He says a more pendulous scrotum increases the risk factors because the testes are more exposed to the elements. Some producers speculate even when bulls have shelter, such as a shed, some of the older bulls tend to lie outside, away from the group. The older bulls may be loners, preferring to be off by themselves, and therefore more vulnerable to cold temperatures. † Heather Smith Thomas ranches with her husband Lynn near Salmon, Idaho. Contact her at 208-756-2841.

ANIMAL WELFARE

MB rancher jailed for starving cattle

BY ANDREW ALLENTUCK

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tarving 67 beef cattle to death and leaving 52 near death recently got a southwestern Manitoba rancher convicted of animal abuse. Thomas Jeffrey McLean will spend 45 days in jail. It’s the first time in two decades anyone guilty of livestock abuse has received jail time, but the offense was egregious. In addition to incarceration — the sentence can be served on weekends — provincial court judge Mary Kate Harvie also ruled that the rancher could never own livestock again.

The offense was irrational, for the herd had value. It begs for an explanation.

According to trial testimony, leaving the herd to starve appears to have been an act of spite against his brother, Scott McLean. The cattle were deliberately starved to reduce the value of the estate which was disputed after the death of their mother in 2008. That Jeffrey knew how to care for cattle was not in doubt,

for as the Manitoba Provincial Chief Veterinarian’s Office Lead Investigator, Dr. Terry Whiting, said in a summary of the case.

“The producer was competent.

Farm records from the previous year show 49 calves born alive from 53 cows exposed, and 49 calves weaned from 49 born alive.

That is well within target production standards for beef cattle in Manitoba.”

The herd’s condition came to the notice of McLean’s neighbours in the winter and the office of the provincial veterinarian was alerted, Whiting said. “There is no doubt that this was a deliberate act, an act of spite, in relation to his personal dispute with his brother over an estate.”

Manitoba’s Animal Care Amendment Act, which went into effect in 2012, clarifies that those in charge of animals must provide a generally understood level of care for them. The Act specifies that those in charge of animals, “ensure adequate food and water, ensure medical attention, protect animals from excessive heat or

PHOTO: FILE PHOTO

The cattle in this file photo are being well looked after in winter, but a Manitoba court has sent a message that not properly feeding cattle, and in fact deliberately starving them to death, will land you in jail. cold; do not confine animals in inadequate space or unsanitary conditions, do not confine animals without adequate ventilation or without providing them opportunity for exercise.”

An exemption weakens the requirement, noting that the section “does not apply to situations consistent with standards or codes of conduct with generally accepted practices or procedures.” Starving cattle to death is, of course, nobody’s generally accepted practice.

What makes the McLean case important is that it was willful and avoidable. Yet cattle death by starvation is a persistent annual problem in Manitoba, Whiting said. In a scholarly article for the

Canadian Veterinary Journal published in November, 2012, he said herds with more than 10 per cent overwinter death loss are often observed. For example, Manitoba herds lost 110 head to winterkill in March 2005.

Weather and neglect account for almost all cases of herd starvation, but there remains the question of what to do. The baseline, as he said, “if you feed animals, they will not starve and, for the most part, they can handle very cold weather.”

Yet the issues related to animal starvation form a web of complexity. “Spousal abusers threaten pets and a third of women in abusive relationships will not leave for fear that their spouse will harm their pets,” Whiting said.

There is also the problem of community, Whiting said. “If farmers trust agricultural and veterinary authorities to do the right thing and understand that our motivation — that of the provincial veterinarian is not politically driven — then we can have their co-operation.” What made the McLean case distinctive is that it was not the result of incompetence or stupidity.

It was meanness. And, one might add, heartlessness.

Yet these hard cases are steps to focus on animal welfare laws, which can lead both to better lives for pets and livestock and even to better weight gain and profits for producers. † Andrew Allentuck is a Grainews columnist, based in Winnipeg.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

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Cattleman’s Corner WINTER FEEDING

Winter cereals pressed into double duty

BY LEE HART

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cott Lehr’s winter cereal seeding plays a doubleheader. It serves as winter pasture for his bred cow herd, and the next summer he usually harvests a productive silage crop off the same stand as feed for backgrounding calves.

It’s a system that may not work in all areas of Western Canada, but for the southeast Alberta rancher the combination of relatively low snow cover, usually milder winter temperatures and having irrigation available makes for a simple, lower-cost winter feeding system.

Lehr, who along with family members operate Short Grass Ranch just north of Medicine Hat, has been using winter cereals for winter pasture since 2005. He works mainly with winter wheat and winter triticale although occasionally adds spring cereal crops or vetches to the mix.

“We are pushing the limits with winter grazing and some years we may have a bit of winterkill, but usually the winter cereal bounces back the next spring,” says Lehr.

“Even if we do have some winterkill and have to reseed, I know we are definitely dollars ahead compared to putting up hay or hauling out feed.”

SPRING CROP FIRST Lehr seeds spring cereals such as barley, triticale and wheat on part of 950 acres of irrigated land in the spring and harvests silage in August.

He also usually has about 200 acres of corn, also harvested for silage.

Once the spring-seeded cereals have been silaged, he then reseeds about 600 acres of the fields to winter cereals. Most of the time he seeds AC Bellatrix, a Hard Red Winter wheat, although he has also

PHOTOS: SCOTT LEHR

Left: Some of Scott Lehr’s beef herd grazing on winter cereals on his SE Alberta ranch. Right: A shovel indicates the amount of forage produced on Lehr’s winter cereal seeding, blended with tillage radish. tried CDC Ptarmigan, a soft white winter wheat. Of the triticale varieties he prefers Pika winter triticale.

For the past couple of years he has also added about two pounds of tillage radish seed to the winter cereal seedings. It provides some variety in the cow diet and the deep roots of the radish also help loosen the soil on the fields, which are direct seeded. He applies about 55 pounds of nitrogen per acre at time of seeding.

“I tend to prefer the Bellatrix and Pika because they are very leafy varieties and very productive,” says Lehr.

The 1,100-head cow herd is moved onto the winter cereal seeding in late October/early November as cattle come home from grazing on the mostly native grass summer pasture. Calves are weaned and moved into backgrounding feedyards, while the cow herd grazes the winter cereals.

“We usually put them on the winter cereals in November and they stay there until they start calving in April,” says Lehr. “Most years snow isn’t a problem in this area and they graze all winter. Even a few inches of snow isn’t a problem, but if you get a foot or more, or if it

begins to get crusty then they have a hard time grazing.”

Along with the winter cereal grazing, Lehr does provide a chopped hay and straw supplement. The hay and straw is top dressed with a liquid molasses mineral.

“Their first choice is to graze the winter cereal and most days they barley look at the hay or straw,” he says. “We add the mineral supplement because they like the taste and at least we know they are getting their minerals.”

As the cow herd moves off the winter cereal pastures in April, Lehr applies between 120 and 140 pounds of actual nitrogen (based on soil test recommendations) with a 3/4-inch knife on 12-inch spacings. And as needed he turns on the irrigation system.

“We really push the grazing,” he says. “The cows have full access to the seeding over the winter and they take it right down. Sometimes it looks like summerfallow when they are moved out. Even though we hit it hard it usually bounces back quite well.” Some years there are winterkill areas that will be reseeded to a spring crop, but he says usually with fertilizer and water the winter cereals come back nicely.

The summer after grazing, the winter cereals produce a 12- to 13-tonne silage crop. He says there is a possibility the winter cereal stand would be good enough to let mature to produce a grain crop, but he wants the silage “and with the fertility we have on there it would be badly lodged,” says Lehr.

RADISH ROOTS WORK He appreciates having tillage radish in the mix to help break through any compacted soil below the surface. The radish tuber grows about six to eight inches long, while the taproot extends at least 16 inches into the soil profile.

“We do a lot of digging when the crop is growing to see where the roots are,” he says. “With canola, it will go down so far and then the roots turn sideways as soon as it hits a hard layer. With sunflower we find the roots just go fibrous when they hit any hard soil, but with the radish those roots just go right down. And the crop has good feed value too. The cows clean them up.”

Even though the winter cereal produces a very lush pasture, particularly when the cows are first

turned in, the herd experiences no adverse effects and quite easily make the transition from native grass to the cereal seeding.

The practice of grazing winter cereals has caught the eye of Farming Smarter, the southern Alberta applied research association. Working with Lehr, Farming Smarter has launched a research project to evaluate the potential of the dual-purpose crop. With the first year of the three-year project launched in 2013, the study is looking at different winter wheat, winter triticale and fall rye varieties, at different seeding rates, and also in crop blends to see if there are any outstanding performances.

The project will also look at the economics of using winter cereals.

“The economics is something I would like to nail down a bit better,” says Lehr. “I really haven’t looked at that myself. I know what we’re doing is more economical than producing and feeding hay or silage, but it would be good to know how our daily winter feeding costs stack up compared to other feeding options.” † Lee Hart is editor of Cattleman’s Corner based in Calgary. Contact him at 403-592-1964 or by email at lee@fbcpublishing.com.

THE MARKETS

Weaker CDN $ helps offset “COOL effect” JERRY KLASSEN MARKET UPDATE

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’ve received a few inquiries lately in regards to the outlook of the Canadian dollar and how a stronger U.S. greenback influences local cattle prices. The Canadian dollar recently dropped to four-year lows against the U.S. dollar and it appears the trend is not over. We have seen a drop in fed cattle exports to the U.S. since November largely due to COOL, while feeder cattle exports remain sharply above year-agolevels. At the same time, wholesale boxed beef prices are trading near historical highs, enhancing demand for processed beef products south of the border. So what is ahead for coming months?

Currency values are largely determined by monetary policy of the central governments. Since the recession of 2009, the U.S. Federal Reserve was buying longer-term bonds in an effort to lower interest rates for housing purchases and stimulate the economy. The activ-

ity of buying bonds drives up the bond price but lowers the yield. For example, when a person locks in their mortgage for a five-year term, it is based and sometimes hedged on a yield of a five-year government bond and that is why there are costs if you need to break this mortgage term.

Without going into detail, we have now seen the U.S. government ease its bond-buying program (known as Quantitative Easing), causing bond prices to decrease and yields increase. The U.S. Federal Reserve has been buying $85 billion in bonds a month but this program will decrease to $75 billion in January. Longer term, this bond-buying volume will slowly decline as the economy improves. What does this have to do with the Canadian dollar?

BOND — U.S. BOND If bond yields or interest rates are increasing in the U.S. while Canadian yields are staying the same, the currency needs to reflect this change; otherwise there is an arbitrage opportunity. Very simply, if interest rates are the same in each country, then there is no benefit to change one currency into another

currency because the return after one year is the same. If one currency has a higher interest rate, there will be a financial incentive to change the currency into the other currency and receive the higher rate. However, financial markets are extremely efficient and when bond yields increase in the U.S., the Canadian dollar weakens so that their is no arbitrage opportunity.

Another factor driving exchange rates is the demand for Canadian dollars versus demand for the U.S. greenback and this is largely due to trade. For example, when petroleum countries repatriate their U.S. funds, there is usually a bounce in the Canadian dollar because they sell the greenback and buy Canadian dollars. The Canadian dollar is largely resource-based on crude oil, gold and metals and the gold and metals made their highs in the first half of 2011 and have been declining since then.

Under a normal trading environment, a weaker Canadian dollar would enhance the values of feeder cattle and fed cattle. U.S. buyers would have a stronger currency, giving them more buying power so cattle in Canada and the U.S. are priced the same at the U.S. destination. When this article was

written in early February, we had not noticed a sharp decline in the exports of fed cattle since COOL started to influence the overall market in early December.

COOL EFFECT We have seen the basis for fed cattle become more volatile, but it is also important to note U.S. cattle prices have been trending higher. Certain packers have been caught short and the additional costs of labelling are built into the price. The retail beef market is also developing under COOL as there is uncertainty how the U.S. consumer will respond longer term.

The market may not realize the full effect of the weaker loonie in the short term because of the uncertain market conditions related to COOL. Local basis levels from a specific plant can also become extremely volatile when extreme adverse weather influences a certain cattle feeding region. In any case, if we look at the market theoretically, after factoring in the “COOL discount or COOL effect,” the weaker Canadian dollar should enhance prices for fed cattle and wholesale boxed beef moving to the U.S. or offshore longer term.

Feeder cattle exports during 2013 were up 133 per cent over 2012. COOL is having a limited effect on feeder cattle finished in U.S. feedlots. There is additional demand surfacing for Canadian feeder cattle due to the stronger buying power of the U.S. greenback relative to the Canadian dollar. Canadian feeder cattle prices have been lagging the U.S. market but this spread should narrow longer term, which is good news for cow-calf producers.

The Federal Reserve quantitative easing program will decline through 2014, causing U.S. interest rates to increase. This will cause the Canadian dollar to weaken against the U.S. greenback.

Looking at previous history, the Bank of Canada lags the U.S. by approximately six to eight months so we can probably expect a marginal increase in Canadian interest rates in late 2014.

Canadian fed and feeder cattle prices will be enhanced by the weaker Canadian dollar longer term. † Gerald Klassen analyzes cattle and hog markets in Winnipeg and also maintains an interest in the family feedlot in southern Alberta. For comments or speaking engagements, he can be reached at gklassen7@hotmail.com or call 204 899 8268.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Cattleman’s Corner environment

Researchers looking for greenhouse gas answers on the farm

BY ANGELA LOVELL

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griculture Canada researchers are not only working to identify where most greenhouse gases (GHG) are produced on Canadian beef and dairy operations, but also the greater challenge of finding economical and practical strategies for reducing emissions.

Because methane from cow-calf operations and dairy farms is the largest contributor to the overall agriculture GHG picture, the goal is to find production practices that reduce GHGs, but still make economic sense.

“One of the issues that’s come along in the last 10 to 20 years has been a concern about GHG emissions coming from livestock agriculture, primarily ruminants,” says Karen Beauchemin, ruminant nutrition research scientist with AAFC’s Lethbridge Research Centre. “I was very interested in identifying the main sources of GHG emissions and looking at what we can change in the way we produce meat and milk.”

The farm life cycle assessments for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from dairy and beef production were made using “Holos” modeling software program developed by AAFC (see sidebar).

METHANE EMISSIONS Methane, a potent GHG, is produced in the rumen of cattle as a byproduct of fermentation, especially from a forage-based diet.

Roughly half of all GHG emissions that come from dairy operations are direct methane emissions from milk cows or replacement animals.

“They are necessary emissions associated with digesting feed so that’s a normal process of digestion, which means what we feed the cows is important and anything we can do to reduce the emissions in the digestion process would also have a very big impact on the net GHG emissions associated with producing milk,” says Beauchemin.

Beef cattle are trickier to assess

because of the various production stages from cow-calf to backgrounding to feedlot.

“Even when you account for all that life cycle, still over 60 per cent of all the GHG emissions is methane from digestion,” says Beauchemin. “Most of that is from the cow-calf operation and so what we feed cows and growing calves has a big impact on that carbon footprint.”

That turns popular wisdom about beef production on its head. Many consumers have the impression feedlots are producing the most GHG emissions, but that’s not the case, says Beauchemin. “The finishing process is only a very small part of the emissions depending on if it’s a yearling or if it’s a weaned calf. The net amount of GHG emissions coming from the feedlot is roughly 20 or 25 per cent.

You can reduce emissions from the feedlot, but it’s not going to have as big an impact as reducing emissions from the cow-calf enterprise.”

Beauchemin says Canada is among the most efficient countries of the world in reducing GHG from traditional beef production.

THE BIGGER PICTURE A team of researchers looked at the life cycle assessment of GHG emissions from the whole farm. There are also emissions from manure in storage or when it is applied to the land, as well as emissions from inorganic N fertilizers. There are also emissions associated with seeding, spraying, harvesting and handling feed and manure.

“The question became where and what do we need to target on the farm to make the biggest impact to lower GHG emissions,” says Beauchemin. “We focused our life cycle from the cradle to the farm gate. We don’t have much influence beyond the farm gate but we wanted to know the amount of GHG emissions produced on the farm to produce a kilogram of meat or a litre of milk.”

HOW DO I BENEFIT? Most cattle producers would agree that reducing GHG is worthwhile, but would ask, “What’s in it for me?”

Beauchemin says reducing GHG and improving production efficiency can go hand in hand.

“When you calculate the carbon footprint, which is really the GHG emissions per litre of milk or a kilogram of meat, it’s a ratio,” says Beauchemin. “The more product you can get from the system, the lower the carbon footprint… so what we want to do is take the whole farm and look at the production systems and identify the weakest links.

Where are the inefficiencies?

Those inefficiencies are often costing the farmer money, and they’re also leading to increased GHG emissions.”

A simple example, says Beauchemin, is animal death losses.

An open cow in the herd, or a calf that dies means an animal producing GHG emissions for a year, and no revenue for the farmer.

“So anything that improves cow reproductive physiology or cowcalf survival or the health of the animals, will improve your bottom line and also decreases GHG emissions.”

Similarly, managing cows to increase longevity would reduce costs and GHG emissions, particularly in the dairy industry, says Beauchemin. “The average lactation length in dairy herds is very low in Canada and other developed nations and because of that we have to carry a lot of heifers as replacements which need to be fed. It’s costing you money and it’s creating GHG emissions too.”

Another example is manure management. “Manure is a valuable resource on the farm in terms of nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus,” says Beauchemin.

“But if you don’t use that manure properly, and have to buy inorganic fertilizers, that’s costing money and you’re not getting maximum benefit out of the manure. That’s also adding to your GHG emissions.”

Research shows cow-calf beef operations contribute more to the production of greenhouse gases than the previously suspected feeding operations.

FINDING LOW-COST SOLUTIONS The more forage an animal consumes, the more methane emissions are produced, but forage can be used effectively and still reduce GHG emissions.

Early harvesting would reduce the carbon footprint because the forage is less fibrous. Feeding alfalfa rather than grass also reduces emissions. Feeding corn or barley silage instead of grass, in general also tends to lower the carbon footprint, because it has higher starch content and is more easily digested.

Research has already shown feeding more grains and adding any form of fat to the diet — like canola oil — reduces methane emissions, but Beauchemin says there has to be good arguments for incurring the extra costs.

“I’m not about to start promoting feeding more grain to animals because I think we’re already feeding enough in most cases,” says Beauchemin. “There are lots of different fats and oils that are relatively inexpensive. But you don’t want to start changing a diet just to reduce methane emissions unless you can capture the value somehow. For example, if we had a niche market in Europe or North America where people were willing to pay for meat with a lower carbon balance — but at this point that’s not quite there.”

FUTURE RESEARCH Future research may provide an economical way to formulate diets to reduce methane emissions and recapture feed energy.

Some scientists are researching biochemical and microbial means to try and change the way that feed is fermented in the rumen.

Researchers in New Zealand are currently working on the development of a simple, cost-effective vaccine that could be used to reduce methane emissions.

Another company Beauchemin is working with is trying to develop a biochemical feed additive, which in some initial studies helps reduce methane emissions in beef cattle by up to 32 per cent.

“We replicated the initial shortterm study over a longer term just to see if those emissions eventually came back or learn if bacteria in the rumen had adapted,” she says. “We found over a four- or five-month period the emissions remained low.”

Another study is assessing the effects the feed additive has on the growth rate of the cattle. “It’s very experimental at this point and we don’t know what it’s going to cost but in theory it could be cost effective in rations. Right now we don’t know about the cost of feeding for low-methane diets.”

Beauchemin says there will have to be a value on lowering GHG emissions that delivers an economic incentive for farmers.

“Unless we have value on lowering GHG emissions I don’t suggest farmers rebalance their diet for that, unless it also makes economic sense,” she says. “But it is good to know what you feed does have an impact on both GHG emissions and the bottom line.

Longer term we’re looking at solutions that could be a simple fix like a feed additive.

“There are also people looking at improving the genetics so animals are more efficient and eat less. When they eat less, you need less feed and ultimately there are fewer emissions. So I think there are some longer term solutions coming.” † Angela Lovell is a freelance writer based in Manitou, Man.

What is your GHG status?

H

olos is a software program developed by Agriculture Canada that estimates greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of farms. The free program uses a whole farm as a model and can be used by producers and industry decision-makers to test possible ways of reducing GHG emissions from farms.

Users can select scenarios and farm management practices that best describe their operation and then adjust these practices to see the effect on emissions.

Examples of these adjustments include changing livestock feed, reducing tillage or including perennial forages in rotation.

Once information is entered into the program, Holos estimates carbon dioxide, nitrous oxide and methane emissions. The sources of emissions include enteric fermentation and manure management, cropping systems and energy use. Carbon storage and loss from lineal tree plantings and changes in land use and management are also estimated. The result is a GHG gas emission estimate for the whole farm that can help the user identify ways to reduce farm emissions.

Holos 2.0 was released in March 2013 and includes updated Canadian data based on new beef and dairy research. For a copy of Holos email Holos@ agr.gc.ca. †

Extending the longevity of dairy cows in a herd is one measure that would reduce greenhouse gas emissions, as fewer replacement heifers would be needed.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

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Cattleman’s Corner REPORT FROM DOWN UNDER

Angus dominate Australian beef production

BY KIM NIELSEN

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ustralia is similar to Canada in having a large beef production relative to a small domestic market and both countries export roughly the same, 60 per cent or so. Both countries are as well eyeing the Asian markets and there is renewed optimism among beef producers here in Australia at the moment with record high live exports to Indonesia in 2013 of 350,000 head and a new Free Trade Agreement with South Korea just recently announced.

Australia is BSE free and there are no export criteria into Asia of the beef having to be from beef less than 30 months of age such as for Canadian beef. This is a tremendous advantage in a country with a much varied and relatively dry climate and slaughter cattle between the ages of 18 months to five years.

This sets the stage for some distinctly different production and marketing parameters to Canada.

On the Outback cattle stations in Northern Australia, many spanning several hundred thousand acres of marginal land, the bullock are of different genetics, the Bos indicus cattle . The first cut of these Brahman-influenced cattle go into feedlots, but the second-cut cattle are kept at home destined for the live Indonesian market shipped out of Darwin. Here it is size over age with many of the bullocks reaching four to five years of age before slaughter. Grass is abundant and plentiful this year so it should not come as a surprise that 70 per cent of the beef production is grass-fed beef.

A recent deal between Cargill and the Australian beef exporter and processor giant Teys Australia is see-

ing an increasing volume of grassfed beef coming to North America and competitive due to the low cost of production. (Editor’s note: Teys is also supplying hormone-free beef to A&W in Canada). photo: kim neilsen

PRICES

An auctioneer leads the sale of a pen of black cattle at a typical Australian market.

When I compare the growth performance figures of the calves just sold here in Hamilton I would have to think they are very much on par with Alberta calves. The best set of calves I saw weighed in at 880 lbs. at eight months but price wise probably lacking $200 to $300 selling at around $0.90/ lb. So why is the Victorian cattle producer content with these prices? It can only be from lower cost of production. Year-round

grazing is common with calves weaned at four to five months of age and only these growing calves receiving supplemental feed. I saw some cattle records the other day of a well-run cow-calf operation of 300 cows. The farm’s gross margin sheet showed the income from calves and culls less the variable costs such as vet costs, bull replacement costs, vaccines, preg testing, feed and sales commissions. The only other costs missing were costs

of heifers coming into the herd as well as pasture cost. Nonetheless, the net returns were astonishing, nearly 60 per cent of the value of the cow herd. The cost of supplemental feed was $20 per cow!

Therein perhaps lies the contentment. † Kim Juul Nielsen, retired Manager of Agricultural Services, Clearwater County, Alberta is a summertime resident of Alcheringa, Dunkeld, Victoria, Australia and Canadian summertime grazier of 4-Clover Ranch, Rocky Mountain House, Alberta

ANGUS BEEF FEATURED Elsewhere on the domestic front the specific CAAB logo (Certified Australian Angus Beef) dominates the high-end store market. CAAB beef is DNA traceable (100 per cent Angus genetics), grain fed for a minimum 120 days, all cuts aged for 21 days and the strip loin aged for 28 days.

On the export scene Angus branding is effective as well. In the sales ring Angus cattle are often paid premiums when meeting the European Union Certified Angus criteria, no growth promoting hormones at any time and DNA traceable. The lucrative Angus Certified Japanese market similarly dictates a purebred animal. Not surprisingly, 61 per cent of Australian cattle are black.

There might be another good reason for the high number of Angus cattle, perhaps the consistent performance under harsh conditions climatically across Australia. Here in Victoria we are just going through the annual calf market and the local Hamilton auction market is selling steers for the entire week with heifers following next week.

ON SALE DAY The sales typically last two to three hours with 2,000 to 3,000 head sold in individual ownership pens with auctioneers above the pens on a catwalk auctioneering along the same lines as in Canada.

The calves selling here at the beginning of 2014 are fall born (AprilMay 2013), just before the wet winter season so, opposite season apart, they are not unlike Canadian calves sold in the Canadian fall.

From here the calves’ destiny is vastly different from feedlots. It’s back out on grass for additional cheap weight gain before grain finishing or for the pure grass-fed market, never receiving a kernel of grain. These slower-growing cattle are remarketed as bullocks at the age of two to three years of age.

Some of these will, however, go on a longer grain ration in feedlots for the heavily marbled Japanese bullock market surpassing three years of age before slaughter.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Home Quarter Farm Life SEEDS OF ENCOURAGEMENT

Encouraging the heart of your farm Keep this list to remind you to act out practical encouragement ELAINE FROESE

F

ebruary is heart month, all month. The list of 10 ways you can encourage the heart of your farm was created originally by Doug Stroh, who now works at MNP. Stroh has given me permission to use this checklist with my coaching clients and audiences because it has stood the test of time.

James Kouzes and Barry Posner have written about exemplary leaders who exhibit these key abilities: • Challenge the process; • Inspire a shared vision; • Enable others to act; • Model the way; • Encourage the heart.

You’ll note that the top management gurus include the need to have heart in our business. Kouzes’ and Posner’s “set clear standards” would align with the idea of having a clear sense of purpose and values. If you would like a values assessment for your farm team, contact me at elaine@elainefroese.com. “Expect

the best” from Kouzes can be translated to having a high level of trust. How are you expecting the best from your farm team and employees? Posner wants teams to “pay attention” which converts to watching for the outcomes and paying attention to results, in

If my hubby might say, “Elaine I feel like I am getting leftovers in a brown paper bag,” it means that I need to allocate more time to family than to my work. Word pictures are powerful to communicate a story that motivates folks to listen.

When you have clearly defined roles and responsibilities, everyone knows what is expected of them, and can do their jobs well other words accountability. Some farms that I coach are allowing bad behaviour to continue unchecked.

Are there consequences on your farm to keep folks accountable for their attitudes and their actions?

Open clear communication is a lofty goal, and sometimes folks need help to be better listeners, and clear with their intentions.

Use stories to help clarify how you are feeling and talk about what you are needing. Gary Smalley and John Trent call this using “word pictures.”

How are you encouraging personal growth on your farm? Do you show recognition verbally or with gifts of time? One consultant recently shared that he was working hard for the founder to just say, “I love you son, and am thankful for all you do around here.”

Unfortunately the son is ready to bolt because he feels taken for granted. Dad still has not mustered the courage to say, “I love you.”

Balancing work and family is an

ongoing issue for all generations, but really hits home for the young generation. Take time to celebrate together to encourage the heart of your family, and ultimately your business. It is not a badge of honour to proclaim that you have not left the farm in three years! Strong families celebrate together, and take time for renewal.

When you have clearly defined roles and responsibilities, everyone knows what is expected of them, and can do their jobs well.

Kouzes and Posner call this part of encouraging the heart of business “Set the Example.” If you want better attitudes on your farm, check your attitude. If you want people to be punctual, show up on time. If you want honesty in transactions, don’t lie or “work the books.”

I hope you cut out this checklist and put it where you will be reminded to act out practical encouragement for your farm team. † Elaine Froese, CAFA, CHICoach has been encouraging farm families for over 34 years. Visit www.elainefroese.com to gain more insights on building a strong farm family. Watch for her new book, Farming’s In-law Factor due out in April.

Send letters to elaine@elainefroese.com or call 1-866-848-8311.

Encouraging the Heart of your Farm 1. Clear sense of purpose and values.

2. Open, clear communication.

3. Willingness to accept differences.

4. Personal growth encouraged.

5. High level of trust.

6. Clearly defined roles and responsibilities.

7. Accountability.

8. Balance between work and play.

9. Regular discussions with action.

10. Outside perspectives welcome.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

33

Home Quarter Farm Life

What’s the secret?

What makes three farms operating as one such a success?

BY CHRISTALEE FROESE

‘

W

hat’s the secret?’ is a question the Weichel family is often asked.

With three generations and multiple families working together as a unit, everyone wants to know what the secret is to keeping three farms operating like one.

For 85-year-old Mike Weichel and his wife Babe, 80, the secret lies in the history of the farm, which was founded by Mike’s father in 1928.

“I’m from the old school and I always say, ‘land is land and it should stay in the family,’” said Mike.

Mike Sr. and Babe were fortunate to have both of their children choose farming as careers. The eldest son, Harvey, took up farming right out of high school, creating a separate farmyard and home just a half-mile down the road from his dad’s mixed farm.

The youngest son, Barry, eventually took over his parents’ farmyard, working alongside his dad and brother to build up their cattle herds and land base. According to the Weichel brothers, some of the good chemistry lies in the genetics of the situation as Harvey and Barry married sisters, Patty and Kathy Haines.

Kathy knows that the ability to work together like one big happy family comes, in part, from the fact that she and her sister married brothers and raised their children just down the road from each other.

“I feel like Harvey and Patty’s kids are mine,” said Kathy, who has two children of her own. “Even though they call me Aunty Kathy, I really have four kids instead of two.”

Operating as one big family, both in business and in play, has allowed the Weichels to reap benefits on many different levels, from sharing input costs to dividing the labour.

“We all have our jobs. Harvey does the spraying, Barry hauls the grain, Mike still drives the combine and about eight to 10 times a year, we all sit around the table to figure out how things are going to work,” said Kathy.

The next generation is now involved in the operation, with Kathy and Barry’s son, Michael, taking over the home quarter. Barry and Kathy established another farmyard and built a brand new house just metres from their son’s home.

While the bookkeeping isn’t as easy to do as it used to be when Mike was the sole operator of the farm, Kathy and Patty don’t shy away from keeping all the accounts in order. The wives spend countless hours together going through financial statements and dividing both the expenses and the profits between the families.

“If we get down to the point where a few hundred bucks is outstanding, we just split the difference and call it even,” said Patty.

In terms of being the next generation to join the operation, 22-yearold Michael said he is proud to follow in his father’s, uncle’s and grandfather’s footsteps.

“It’s a crazy thing for me to think back to the time that Grandpa had the farm and made a living on just half a section and now we have quarters all over the place.”

With 4,200 acres of cultivated land now part of the Weichel land base, Mike Sr. said the system of operating has changed dramatically.

While he remembers plowing the land with a team of horses, he now regularly drives a combine with a GPS system that allows him to take his hands off the wheel.

“I remember the days when we’d plow with a team of eight horses and we’d start plowing when there was still snow on the ground so we could get it all worked in time for seeding,” said Mike Sr. While the days of horses and plows presented lots of physical labour, Mike Sr. said the inputs were extremely low which always helped with the bottom line. In today’s agricultural climate, with high input costs, the Weichels agree that they

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are fortunate to be in operation together as it has enabled them to invest in new machinery and technology.

“I joke that we have to get along because if we had split up a long time ago, the new machinery we have now would be old,” said Harvey.

As of three years ago, the Weichels got out of cattle completely, feeling that the expanding grain operation was providing enough work on its own. Barry and Kathy’s daughter, Sara, and her husband, Nevin Czerwonka, purchased the cattle and now rent the Weichel pasture land.

The Weichels maintain three immaculate farmyards which are their pride and joy. With ponds, fountains, trees, flowers, gardens, decorative lampposts, pathways

Barry (l to r), Michael, Harvey and Mike Sr. Weichel and lawns that are spectacular in both complexity and scale, yard maintenance is an important part of the Weichel operation.

“We put a lot of effort into it and when you do that, you get a lot of joy and beauty out of it,” said Patty who has pickled about 90 quarts of cucumbers and processed 30 quarts of tomatoes.

With about 100 dozen annuals,

600 trees, numerous hedges and an acre of garden space between the three yards, the Weichels consider landscaping one of their favourite hobbies.

“We take pride in all we do,” said Patty.

And perhaps that’s the greatest secret of all for this close-knit Saskatchewan farm family. † Christalee Froese writes from Montmartre, Sask.

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FEBRUARY 25, 2014

Home Quarter Farm Life POSTCARDS FROM THE PRAIRIES

Life’s secrets, according to you…

JANITA VAN DE VELDE

Start saving from the moment you get your first paycheque, no matter how little it is.

You can’t take it with you.

B

est financial advice?

Never confuse your net worth with the numbers in your bank account — you’re not taking any of it with you. You’re worth as much as any millionaire out there. And if one day, you happen to become one of those people who make millions a year, remember this — you’re no more important than the person who makes nothing.

Don’t ever forget that. A sign of true character is how you treat those who have nothing to give you in return. As the saying goes, we’re all ending up in a box about the same size, so remember that. It’ll help you maintain a healthy perspective. My parents taught me that life is just one giant board game. Play a good game.

Do the best with what you’ve got. Never take more than you give — and in comparison to the rest of the world, we’ve been given so much. Leave the board in good shape. Don’t chew on the corners. And one day? One day you’ll have to pass on your chips. Holding on tighter won’t help you at all.

Your time at the board isn’t up to you. But your moves while you’re here, are.

Here forthwith, are your remaining responses for the best financial advice you’ve ever received: Don’t go into debt unless it’s an investment, like your education, a home, or something that you can get back in the long run.

Balance your chequebook and never spend more than you have.

Financial advice — what’s that?

When it comes to saving, or paying off debt, every penny makes a difference. Nothing is worse than the feeling of: “I have so much to save for, or pay off, where do I even start.” Just start anywhere.

Invest in yourself first.

I pay no attention to finances.

I should, though…

My mom told me to always have my own money so that I’d be able to take care of myself. I fear I take it too far sometimes, and can be very stubborn and too independent. But that has always stuck with me and has served me well. I know that I can make it on my own and support myself and my daughter if I have to.

It’s OK to be in debt if it’s for the right reasons.

Pay off your mortgage prior to building up a nest egg for the future.

Give up on small dreams today and save to make big dreams come true.

Don’t buy it if you can’t afford to take care of it.

Invest in fun, because it is the most important part of life.

I was given a piece of a puzzle that was meant to go into my wallet, so every time I reached into

my wallet, I would see the piece of puzzle and it would remind me of a question I was told to ask myself at that time. The question was, “Is this a want or a need?”

Save, and spend. In that order.

Save for a crisis, and for the future of course, but don’t forget to live for today. What’s the point of all that education, and building up a decent career, if all you do is wait for retirement to have some fun?!

Sometimes the right answer is to run off to Disneyworld and to hell with the cost — we’re building memories over here!

Follow your gut. That, and pay off your credit cards in full every month.

Put away money for your retirement. I started in my early 20s and I’m so glad that I did.

Track your spending.

When saving for a big purchase avoid impulse buying by saying to yourself, “Do I want those shoes MORE than I want a house?”

Lead with your heart and the money will follow.

Live within your means. This advice has served us well.

I don’t think I have ever received any good financial advice.

Save 10 per cent, give 10 per cent and wisely allocate the other 80 per cent.

Never let your pride get in the way of doing what it takes to support yourself. Always know that if your world fell apart tomorrow, you have the skills and the resources to make your own way.

Never depend on someone else to support you.

Never steal money.

After I spent some time complaining about insurance costs, my dad said, “Insurance is something you pay for and hope that you NEVER need.”

And that is true.

Don’t ever brag about what you have.

Learn to count!

Let’s see… what do kids need to know about money other than to have lots? You will probably want a new car someday, say, one that sells for $40,000. You’ve got enough for a down payment, so what’s the next step? If you make payments for five years, you’ll end up paying for it twice, when you consider the interest you’ll be paying. By the time you’re old enough to purchase a car, the days of low interest may be history. Why not set aside the amount of dollars you would be paying each month, save for the same five years and pay cash for the car? Telling you this will not make me popular, obviously, and it may be one of the reasons my grandkids don’t really listen to me. Believe me, five years goes by in a hurry.

Read Andy Sirski’s column in Grainews. By the time you have enough money saved, you may find that a new car really isn’t important. You may decide to use it for school instead.

Being advised to purchase life insurance, set up a will and start a college fund for our kids.

Don’t go into credit card debt.

Have I paid attention? Sadly, no.

You may have to pay more for land that adjoins you, but if you want it, go for it. In a few years, the price will be there anyway.

When I was 26 years old, a man told me that you will be at least 40 years old before you have anything, and he was right.

Open an ING savings account.

There are no fees. And contribute monthly to RRSPs instead of one lump sum per year. Oh, and read the book The Richest Man in Babylon.

Budget yourself. It’s like magic money appears when I follow that advice.

Acquiring land has always been the best decision I have ever made. I cannot consciously take all the credit for these purchases, as my wife always pushed me to buy land which has increased our net worth substantially.

Give what you can away, because you can’t take it with you when you go, but the things we do to help the people on Earth will last a lifetime. † Janita Van de Velde grew up on a farm near Mariapolis, Man. She holds a bachelor of science degree in agricultural economics from the University of Manitoba, and has worked for a financial institution since graduating.

She lives in Regina, Sask., with her husband Roddy and their children Jack, Isla and James.

Her first novel, Postcards Never Written, was the recipient of the Saskatchewan Reader’s Choice Award and also listed by CBC as one of the top funny books in 2009. She donates a portion of proceeds from the sale of her book to World Vision to help those less fortunate.

For more information, or to order her book, visit her website at www.janita.ca.

A penny saved is a penny earned.

You can’t take your money with you to heaven, so you might as well treat yourself a little while you can.

Set goals first, and then track your progress. This works for all things. Be committed or forget about it.

Out-of-this-world snack food Couple’s healthy creation selected to go into space

BY EDNA MANNING

J

udy and Kevin Wilkinson never anticipated their snack food would reach such heights of success. In 2009, their meat and fruit jerky, called Trails End Buffalo Stix Cranberry Craze was selected to be one of 12 Canadian snack foods to go into space through the Canadian Space Agency’s Snacks for Space Competition.

“Chris Hadfield, the first Canadian astronaut to command the international space station, wanted to take some snacks to share with other astronauts. As a result, the Canadian Space Agency launched this contest.

“Unknown to us, our bison stix was nominated by a man named Jeff from Edmonton who had discovered our product at a conference in Saskatoon. Some time later we were informed that our product was going on a space mission,” said Judy.

The couple later found out what Jeff’s last name was and sent him a case of their Trails End Buffalo

Stix. Judy says his random act of kindness resulted in a lot of media attention and their product has become even more popular.

The Wilkinsons’ ranch is located in the boreal forest on the shores of Turtle Lake, Saskatchewan. “We moved out there in 1977. Our goal was to be as self-sufficient as possible and raise our kids away from it all. We had milk cows, and made yogurt, butter, cheese, everything,” said Judy.

They began raising buffalo in 1978 and for a time sold bull calves and yearling bulls, then started selling meat, but the market for bison was limited at that time.

“The idea for the buffalo jerky just came to us one day. We wanted to create a product that was soft, easy to chew, with fruit in it. We didn’t want to call it jerky because people think of jerky as being tough and hard to chew. We wanted something totally different, so we decided on buffalo stix.”

In 2004, the Wilkinsons began working with the Food Centre in Saskatoon to develop the idea.

It is known as extruded jerky, a ground meat product that contains no soy, no wheat, no MSG and has a low sodium content.

Judy’s first choice for an added fruit was blueberries. In test runs, however, it turned out that the blueberries were too juicy and the jerky wouldn’t dry properly. Her second choice was cranberries, which add a delicious flavour to the buffalo meat.

By 2005, the couple had achieved a great deal of success in marketing their product at schools, community concessions, trade shows, and fitness centres in Saskatchewan.

The next phase of their business occurred in 2009. After meeting the strict requirements of the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, they were now able to market their product across Canada.

Today, Trails End Buffalo Stix Cranberry Craze is manufactured at the Food Centre in Saskatoon and at Drake Meat Processors in Drake, Saskatchewan. The product is available at the Sask Made Marketplace in Saskatoon, the

PHOTOS: EDNA MANNING

Top: Kevin and Judy Wilkinson never thought their small business would be so successful. Left: Trails End Buffalo Stix Cranberry Craze was selected to be one of 12 Canadian snack foods to go into space.

Museum bookstore in Regina and the Tunnels in Moose Jaw. “We both love doing the shows — meeting the public and passing out samples. It takes about three to five seconds and you hear, ‘I can’t believe how good this is!’

I love the feedback. People tell us they specifically come to a show for our product, and many come back every year to buy bulk.

That’s really helped our business grow,” said Judy.

The Wilkinsons are delighted and grateful to be able to provide a product that they feel is a healthy snack.

“It’s a quality food, without a lot of byproducts. Bison is a tasty, lean meat, lower in fat than beef.

We’re finding there’s a growing interest in bison meat generally — it’s becoming more mainstream,” said Kevin.

“Many times after a show I’ll say to Kevin that I can’t believe this is happening to us. We didn’t anticipate this little business would be so successful,” said Judy.

For more information, visit www. trailsendbuffalostix.com, or call the Wilkinsons at (306) 845-3056. † Edna Manning writes from Saskatoon, Sask.

FEBRUARY 25, 2014

grainews.ca /

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Home Quarter Farm Life SINGING GARDENER

More on moss

Plus, Ted shares emails regarding potatoes TED MESEYTON

F

irst things first! To begin this is a followup to a request from a reader at Pincher Creek to repeat a recipe I gave a year ago for controlling moss on lawns. Also, most of us are familiar with tomato seedlings sometimes popping up here and there in the garden.

Well the same thing can happen with potatoes too. If I asked what’s the favourite root crop of Canadians, would you answer “spuds?” So let’s add some potato talk intertwined with emails from readers. There may not be space for anything else, but we’ll find out when we get there.

Edna Mackenzie wrote back in January 2013: We have a problem with moss in the lawns — particularly on the north side of the fir trees. The moss seems to be slowly creeping farther out, thinning and destroying the grass. I cannot find anything to kill moss. Can you help by giving me some helpful tips to stop the moss or the name of a moss herbicide? I look forward to your remedy. Best wishes. Thank you.

— Edna Mackenzie Ted replies: Unless you have to deal with it, gardeners may not think of moss as a weed. I won’t be recommending any particular commercial formula other than the following. There’s some suggestion that copper fungicide such as Bordo copper spray (available at garden centres) may help. As a preventive measure it controls early and late blights on tomatoes, but may also kill moss and turn it black in a couple weeks when applied as a diluted spray. You may prefer to try the following first.

SUE ARMSTRONG

LOVE HEARING FROM YOU Do you have a story about a farm or home-based business?

How about some household management tips? Does someone in the family have a special-diet need? Share some of your meal ideas.

Send them to FarmLife, 1666 Dublin Ave., Winnipeg, Man. R3H 0H1. Phone 1-800665-0502 or email susan@ fbcpublishing.com. Please remember we can no longer return photos or material. † Sue Armstrong

HOW TO GET RID OF MOSS … using plain old soap and water. Before indoor plumbing came along, some of you might recall when laundry and dishwater (also known as grey water) were recycled into the garden to help control pests. Based on that simple combo of soap and water, here’s an easy formula that may effectively stop green moss in its tracks.

4 to 5 ounces of liquid soap (not detergent) 4 litres water Slowly blend soap and water without shaking in an empty fourlitre milk jug or large container (do not make suds). Gently pour said mixture into a watering can or hand-held sprayer. Drench the moss with this solution while directing the nozzle tip holes just a few inches above the moss. In about 24 hours or so the moss will start to turn rusty brown and dry up. Afterward, use a wire-toothed lawn rake to gently rake out as much of the dead stuff as possible.

Additional raking may be required.

Often moss is the result of conditions that lack direct sunlight and soil that’s too wet and poorly drained. By core aerating the lawn during spring, you can help reduce soil compaction, improve drainage and strengthen grass root development. Cutting turf too low helps moss get established. Most grasses should be mowed at a height no shorter than 2-1/2 inches.

Purchase grass seed that is suited for tree-shaded or moist areas.

A formula to consider is Shady Glenn lawn mixture available from Early’s Garden Centre in Saskatoon at www.earlysgarden. com or phone 1-800-667-1159.

Early’s also specializes in many other grass seed blends for Western Canada along with seeds of veggies, annual and perennial flowers, herbs and a selection of seed potatoes. It’s usually safe to assume a lawn is lacking essential nutrients wherever moss is growing. Moss usually invades only a thin, unhealthy lawn.

Grass grows best in a pH soil value between 6.5 and 7.0 If soil is too acidic (i.e. pH below 6.0) try spreading on some ground limestone or dolomite lime. A good application amends pH to counteract acidic conditions and sweetens it up.

Wood ashes from your stove or fireplace may be substituted for lime and can be sprinkled on grass or worked into the top three or four inches of garden soil that’s becoming too acidic. Spread one 12-quart bucket of wood ashes (about 48 cupsful) over every 1,000 square feet of lawn or garden space. Do this once every three or four years if soil needs sweetening.

Where there’s a lot of shade, trim back tree and shrub limbs and branches. This allows more sunshine to penetrate. In other words, remove sun blockers. Keep in mind that moss can recolonize unless underlying conditions that encourage its re-entry and development are eliminated.

A hand sprinkling of common sand over the lawn including any bare patches is worthy of consideration each fall. Also apply periodic overseeding with

PHOTO: TED MESEYTON

PHOTO: COURTESY RICHTERS HERBS

In companion planting potatoes get along quite well with beans and catnip but should be kept distant from raspberries, sunflowers, peppers and tomatoes. It’s little known that non-stinging dead nettle (r) is also called purple archangel (Lamium purpureum) and is unlike its nasty distant cousin stinging nettle. When interplanted among potatoes, purple dead nettle deters potato bugs. Seeds of this easily grown annual herb are available from Richters, phone 1-800-668-4372. a suitable lawn seed mix afterward. These suggestions may help rectify problems relative to unwanted moss. Any Grainews readers who’ve successfully dealt with moss issues are welcome to share their experience.

NEXT A COUPLE EMAILS To save space, I’ve done some editing. Deanna Toews writes: Hi Ted. Years ago I read a gardening tip from your page in Grainews regarding using sulphur powder to combat potato bugs. I have been coating my seed potatoes with sulphur when I plant them for quite a few years and haven’t had potato bugs since I started doing this. Last spring I mentioned this to some friends so they tried it also but... it didn’t work for them. They had just as many bugs as they’ve always had. I told them to give the dry seed potato a good coating when planting which is what I started out with the first couple years.

Now they’re asking me why it didn’t work and I can’t answer that. Do you have an explanation on why this is? One of my sisters-in-law put sulphur on when planting her potatoes and they were bug free but she had some that came up voluntarily and those plants had bugs.

I have used garden sulphur from T&T Seeds which is 99.9 per cent and the Green Earth brand from Canadian Tire which says it is 92 per cent. Now I’ve been sprinkling a layer at the bottom of the hole, putting the seed potato in, and then sprinkling another coating on top. I have grown 10 different varieties since I’ve been using sulphur, always buying fresh seed potatoes. I don’t use mulch around my plants.

My husband Ken wonders if the soil pH makes a difference. He had the soil tested around our yard site and the pH ranges from 7.2 to 8.2. We have sandy loam soil with a little peat added. We live in the Whitemouth/Elma, Manitoba area so there are no commercial potato growers in the area.

— Deanna Toews Also received a short note from Phyllis Pregoda in rural central Alberta who writes: The last two years my potatoes have small brown spots on skin that keep going deeper during storage. What is it and how do I prevent it?

TED’S REPLY Shortly I’ll address sulphur use and soil pH, but first let me recommend that gardeners go to www.seedpotatoes.ca or phone Eagle Creek Seed Potatoes, Bowden, Alberta at 1-877-2243939. They sell an excellent selection of early-, mid-season and late-season seed potato varieties, including fingerlings.

Here’s a condensed extract from their website: “A number of people have asked about scab. Bacteria that is present in most soils causes scab. The incidence of scab is dependent on the following factors: variety, soil, pH and moisture. High levels of organic matter increase risk of scab, regardless of variety. Large quantities of straw or manure added to your garden site raise the percentage of organic matter and increase such risk. Sandy soil, which is low in organic matter, has a low risk of scab. Dry years tend to be worse than wet years for scab. Scab only affects the appearance of the potato and does not affect the eating quality of the flesh of the tuber. In a dry year keeping the soil moist with watering is an excellent tool to reduce scab. It is possible to amend the pH of your soil using both organic and nonorganic methods. The ideal pH for potatoes is between 4.8 and 5.5, which is slightly more acidic than most vegetables prefer. In less acidic soils, potatoes are more prone to scab.”

Now we know the common scab fungus, Streptomyces scabies, which causes raised scabby marks on potato skin is not active in soil in the pH range indicated above. (i.e. 4.8 to 5.5). You can still grow good-quality potatoes in the slightly acid range of 6.0 to 6.5. However, the lower pH range is preferred for greater yields and less disease. The long and the short of it is this — if scab disfigures too much of your potato crop, focus on keeping your soil pH range down. Neutral is 7.0 and anything higher than that on the pH scale indicates an alkaline condition is starting. To counteract it, avoid adding lime and wood ashes as too much can change slightly acidic soil to an alkaline condition.

New whole seed can be green sprouted (chitted) prior to planting and ensures earlier emer-

gence by two to three weeks prior to your desired planting date. I, Ted, suggest you wet sprouted seed potatoes with water first, next roll them in dry sulphur in a sturdy bag and then plant. I also go along with Deanna’s practice of “sprinkling a layer of sulphur at the bottom of the hole, putting the seed potato in, and then sprinkling another coating on top.” Let me also repeat a suggestion I gave many moons ago.

Buy a whole bunch of so-called penny matchbooks (not the wooden ones) and deposit four of these sulphur-tipped matches around each sulphur-rolled seed potato before covering over. This practice also helps provide an acidic environment. Plants won’t be bothered by potato bugs as much and potatoes will be clean and smooth. Rotate potatoes to a different planting site each year, where possible.

SPEAKING OF THE MOON AND ALL There’s nothing complicated about using the moon as a guide in agriculture and gardening to increase both pleasure and profit. But one very important rule is sometimes neglected. Always apply common sense. When it’s not possible to use the best planting dates according to the moon for farming and gardening, we then just do the best we can. My recommended 2014 lunar planting dates for potatoes are as follows: March 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, April 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, May 13, 14, 17, 18, June 9, 10, 13, 14, and 15. †

This is Ted Meseyton the Singing Gardener and Grow-It Poet from Portage la Prairie, Man. When you boil potatoes use a stainless steel pan, as little water as possible, keep the lid on and cook quickly. Do not add any common table salt but instead add a few chopped raisins and some squirts of lemon juice to preserve the mineral salts and improve flavour. My email address issinginggardener@mts.net.

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