Here they just call it The Valley. More properly it’s the Red River Valley, and the river itself is correctly known as the Red River of the North, to distinguish it from the Red River in Texas that’s famous from story and song.
Probably you’ve heard of this Red River yourself — especially in the spring when the river is rising. In 1997 it made headlines around the world when “The Flood of the Century” devoured thousands of acres of farmland and, after nearly destroying Grand Forks, North Dakota, threatened to swamp the city of Winnipeg.
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It’s enough to make you wonder why anyone would want to live here, much less try to farm here.
But behind the headlines is the real story, and when you dig into it a bit, you quickly realize that the unique nature of the region’s geography, climate and soil types can be a curse sometimes, but it’s also frequently a blessing.
In a western context, the emphasis is on that one word, unique.
The numbers quickly prove it. Soybeans have jumped from less than 1,000 acres just over a decade ago to a new high of 450,000 acres this year. Corn is solidly established too, with over 200,000 acres and per-acre yields that can top 250 bushels.
Unlike the Prairies proper, which really start a few miles west at the top of the Manitoba escarpment, rainfall in the Valley
isn’t the constant yield-limiting factor. And then there’s the unique mix of crops, not seen anywhere else in the region. Alongside the traditional wheat and canola you’ll also find stands of corn and soybeans.
Some days in the middle of the summer you can find parts of the Valley that look more like Iowa than Manitoba. Corn has been a fixture in the valley since the early ’70s, and soys a more recent arrival.
Basically the Red River Valley is neither fish nor fowl, as the saying goes. Instead it is a border region not just politically, with the 49th parallel dividing it into U. S. and Canadian sections, but also ecologically, with attributes of both the Canadian Prairies and the U. S. corn belt.
That’s just part of its one-of-a-kind nature, says local farmer Allan Calder, who runs a 3,000-acre operation that’s “usually split into a quarter corn, soybeans, wheat and canola” along with his brothers Murray and Russell and son Jeffery.
The family has been farming here since 1878, when Allan’s great-grandparents homesteaded near the town of Letellier, just 6-1/2 miles north of the U. S. border. Calder says farmers in the area have a long tradition of exploiting the region’s many blessings. They grow a variety of crops — about a dozen — that simply wouldn’t be possible if they were out on the drier Prairies to the west.
“It’s quite a variety of crops we can grow here,” Calder says. “A lot of the farmers also had experience growing row crops from the sugar beet industry, which was a big thing until that plant closed in the mid-1990s. I think that really helped us and made farmers in the area willing to try some of these different crops.”
It’s a crop mix our Ontario readers would be familiar with — row crops like corn, soybeans and edible beans, along with small cereals and oilseeds like wheat, barley, canola and sunflowers — but it contains a few surprises for Prairie readers, where an exotic like corn is much more often a grazing crop, not planted for grain.
On the border
To understand why farmers in the region have these opportunities we need to understand the unique climatic and geographic reality under which they labour.
The whole story starts about 15,000 years ago, with the melting of the Laurentian Ice Sheet, which covered all of Canada and parts of the northern states. As temperatures rose and the glaciers began to retreat, fresh melt water began to pool into an enormous water body known as Lake Agassiz.
At its peak, Agassiz covered most of Manitoba, a big chunk of northern Saskatchewan, another big chunk of northwestern Ontario and parts of eastern North Dakota and northwestern Minnesota. The terminus of the southern finger can be found just a few miles into South Dakota.
Over the years, sediments settled from the water, laying down deep, rich sedimentary soils in the Red River Valley. Scientists theorize that the melting ice sheet eventually moved back enough to allow the lake to quickly drain to the north into the Arctic Ocean, which they say may have caused major ocean currents to temporarily stop, causing a centuries-long period of global cooling.
After receiving the endowment of rich soil, the region then got another legacy as the new climate shook out — more, and more reliable rainfall. Paul Bullock, an agrometeorologist and soil scientist with the University of Manitoba, has been working on weather and agriculture for years. He’s the former head of the Canadian Wheat Board’s weather and crop surveillance department and he says there’s no question that the combination of soil and climate are twin gifts to the region. When Country Guide spoke to him he confirmed that the Red River Valley isn’t quite like any other agriculture region in North America.
“It’s definitely a transition zone,” Bullock explains. “It’s due to a combination of climate and soil — more rainfall and very heavy soil. These soils aren’t unique, there are other areas in the Prairies with similar soils such as south of Regina or east of Saskatoon. But the combination of the two is what’s unique.”
The soil scientist in Bullock compels him to note there’s another piece of the productivity puzzle that’s often overlooked.
“There’s also the soil organic matter,” Bullock explains. “This area was tall grass prairie.”
That meant early settlers found the rich clay soils had a significantly higher level of soil carbon to grow crops, the result of millenia of contributions from the biomass of the tall Prairie grasses and native forages. It’s all combined to create an ability to grow varied crops, Bullock says.
“There isn’t anything else in the Prairie region that has this range of crops,” Bullock says.
“It’s all combined to produce a unique place that’s a bit distinct from everything around it. I’m completely biased, of course, but I think it’s absolutely fascinating.”
“ When You Are Looking At Less Than A Foot Of Slope In A Mile, Every Little Depression Of Two Or Three Inches Can Mean An Acre Or Two Of Water.”
— Allan Calder
On the ground
Back in Letellier, the Calders are managing the reality of farming this land, including the constant pursuit of drainage, following a few rainy days.
In this region even a little depression becomes a big deal, explains Allan Calder, when Country Guide reached him by phone. That requires farmers in the area to do some fancy footwork when it comes to drainage, he says. But with such flat land, we’re not talking about huge drainage ditches.
“Farmers in the area are really just sculpting the land a little bit,” he explains. Sometimes this happens on the fly. That afternoon his son Jeffery had grabbed the quad and headed out on just such a mission, hunting out low spots and running the quad along drainage routes to open up the flow.
“The quad tires may only go down four inches, but that’s enough,” Calder explains. “When you’re looking at less than a foot of slope in a mile, every little depression of two or three inches can mean an acre or two of (standing) water.”
The heavy land with little internal drainage can quickly make for drowned-out spots in a crop. That puts drainage management higher on the “to do” list of a Red River farmer, says Calder.
“Drainage is one of the most important jobs on a farm down here,” he explains.
Some growers in the region have experimented with tile drainage, but the practice isn’t widespread. Instead growers manage that risk by planting more moisture-tolerant crops like soybeans on heavier land and crops like corn on lighter land.
Infrastructure
That do-it-yourself attitude highlights a reality of playing with this diverse crop mix, says one observer. There’s a lack of infrastructure.
John Heard grew up in the corn and soybean country of southern Ontario, but for more than a decade he’s been a soils specialist with Manitoba’s provincial Ag Department. He’s watched with great interest as the Valley has come to look more and more like home — but he says farmers in the region don’t enjoy the same amenities as in southern Ontario.
“Compared to southern Ontario, you’re not going to find the same elevator capacity, for example, never mind drying capacity,” Heard explains. “Here you have a lot more left for the farmer to do on their own.”
Then there’s the basic issue of trying to grow crops so much closer to the limits of their biological capabilities.
“We are at a bigger risk of losing a crop than say Minnesota, or Wisconsin or southern Ontario,” Heard says. “We truly are kind of on the edge. But when you get a good year, you can get fantastic yields… but we do have greater variability in yields for soybeans and corn.”
Despite these risks, Calder is convinced that these crops have found a permanent home in the Red River Valley.
“If a farmer gets a decent return,” he says, “I think you’ll find they’re willing to experiment a bit more and try to develop things that fit.” CG
“ When You Are Looking At Less Than A Foot Of Slope In A Mile, Every Little Depression Of Two Or Three Inches Can Mean An Acre Or Two Of Water.”
— Allan Calder
On the ground
Back in Letellier, the Calders are managing the reality of farming this land, including the constant pursuit of drainage, following a few rainy days.
In this region even a little depression becomes a big deal, explains Allan Calder, when Country Guide reached him by phone. That requires farmers in the area to do some fancy footwork when it comes to drainage, he says. But with such flat land, we’re not talking about huge drainage ditches.
“Farmers in the area are really just sculpting the land a little bit,” he explains. Sometimes this happens on the fly. That afternoon his son Jeffery had grabbed the quad and headed out on just such a mission, hunting out low spots and running the quad along drainage routes to open up the flow.
“The quad tires may only go down four inches, but that’s enough,” Calder explains. “When you’re looking at less than a foot of slope in a mile, every little depression of two or three inches can mean an acre or two of (standing) water.”
The heavy land with little internal drainage can quickly make for drowned-out spots in a crop. That puts drainage management higher on the “to do” list of a Red River farmer, says Calder.
“Drainage is one of the most important jobs on a farm down here,” he explains.
Some growers in the region have experimented with tile drainage, but the practice isn’t widespread. Instead growers manage that risk by planting more moisture-tolerant crops like soybeans on heavier land and crops like corn on lighter land.
Infrastructure
That do-it-yourself attitude highlights a reality of playing with this diverse crop mix, says one observer. There’s a lack of infrastructure.
John Heard grew up in the corn and soybean country of southern Ontario, but for more than a decade he’s been a soils specialist with Manitoba’s provincial Ag Department. He’s watched with great interest as the Valley has come to look more and more like home — but he says farmers in the region don’t enjoy the same amenities as in southern Ontario.
“Compared to southern Ontario, you’re not going to find the same elevator capacity, for example, never mind drying capacity,” Heard explains. “Here you have a lot more left for the farmer to do on their own.”
Then there’s the basic issue of trying to grow crops so much closer to the limits of their biological capabilities.
“We are at a bigger risk of losing a crop than say Minnesota, or Wisconsin or southern Ontario,” Heard says. “We truly are kind of on the edge. But when you get a good year, you can get fantastic yields… but we do have greater variability in yields for soybeans and corn.”
Despite these risks, Calder is convinced that these crops have found a permanent home in the Red River Valley.
“If a farmer gets a decent return,” he says, “I think you’ll find they’re willing to experiment a bit more and try to develop things that fit.” CG
