hanson acres

Hanson Acres: Where is this flight heading?

When the tourist brochure arrived, it looked so innocent

Reading Time: 5 minutes You’re really sure this is a good idea?” Dale asked his wife. “Dale, I’ve had the tickets since December,” Donna said. Then her phone beeped and she looked down at the screen in her hand while she kept talking. “It’s a little late to go changing my mind now. I’d let the other women down. […] Read more

hanson acres

Hanson Acres: Please answer the phone!

By the morning of the third day, Dale Hanson was worried

Reading Time: 4 minutes “I don’t know why he’s not answering his phone,” Dale said to his wife Donna. “Remember the last time you got all worked up about Ed not answering the phone?” Donna said, looking up from her magazine. “He was at a fish fry in the trailer court.” The first year his father had packed up […] Read more


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Hanson Acres: It’s a rink out there

When Dale takes grandson Connor to the arena, all sorts of things begin to slip

Reading Time: 5 minutes Dale Hanson and his son Jeff were out in the shop, trying to fix the electric tarp on their semi trailer. They’d hoped it was just a bad switch, but by mid-morning they’d figured out that the electric motor was seized. They were going to have to go to Regina for a new one before […] Read more

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Hanson Acres: Slipping into the dealership

It’s business — big business — but they’re off to a bumpy start

Reading Time: 5 minutes Damn idiot ought to get a ticket. Driving like that,” Dale shouted, hitting the brakes. The truck slid a little on the slippery highway, but Dale held the wheel and slowed to 80 without coming too close to the back of the green Chevy Malibu in front of them. Dale waited impatiently for his chance […] Read more


Any delays to seeding due to spring rain aren’t expected to be as prolonged as last year’s, Drew Lerner told farmers in Regina. (Leeann Minogue photo)

Minogue: Optimism reigns at FCC outlook meeting

Reading Time: < 1 minute Regina — Despite commodity prices down off recent highs, resurgent transportation problems and crop disease issues across the Prairies, farmers heard all good news at Farm Credit Canada’s Ag Outlook 2015 conference here Tuesday. “The sky’s not falling,” said J.P. Gervais, chief ag economist for Regina-based FCC. Actually, he said, things are pretty good. If […] Read more

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Hanson Acres: The hard decision

Elaine was furious. “I know exactly what you’re doing.”

Reading Time: 5 minutes It was nearly midnight when Elaine and the baby got home. She carried the sleeping little girl in from the car. It had been a long day for one-year-old Jenny. Four and a half hours each way to Saskatoon and back, and a long afternoon entertaining her grandmother while Elaine went to a meeting. Elaine […] Read more


hanson acres

Hanson Acres: Where’d that combine come from?

“He must have seen this coming,” Jeff said. Dale just shook his head

Reading Time: 5 minutes Jeff was looking at his laptop screen at the kitchen table when his father, Dale, came in the back door. “There’s coffee on,” Jeff said, not looking up. “Elaine’s at a meeting in the city, but she left some cookies on the cupboard.” “I’d better pass on the cookies. I just had breakfast in town […] Read more

hanson acres

The Hansons: A family that farms together…

“It’s good working with you people,” Ed said, “but it will be even better not to see you for the next six months.”

Reading Time: 5 minutes The Hansons’ never-ending harvest finally finished on Friday afternoon. They could barely believe they were really done. They’d spent the last three days racing against the rain in the forecast to get to the north end of the soybean field before it got too wet. “I never thought we’d finish this year,” Jeff told his […] Read more


(Dave Bedard photo)

Minogue: Silicon Valley, Saskatchewan style

Reading Time: 2 minutes Jordan Dutchak is bringing Silicon Valley’s working style to Saskatchewan agriculture. This weekend software developers, engineers, students and entrepreneurs will team up with farmers and ag professionals in Saskatoon at Emerging Agriculture, the first Canadian agricultural hackathon, where they hope to develop cutting-edge solutions to agricultural problems. The idea of a “hackathon” originated in the […] Read more

Variable rate technology firm Farmers Edge, whose services include lab analysis of soil, seed and plant tissue, has picked up venture capital funding for expansion. (FarmersEdge.ca)

Minogue: Precision farming seeks new converts at new price point

Reading Time: 2 minutes Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield + Byers is investing in ag technology with a new stake in Farmers Edge — which in turn now hopes to build its services’ popularity through more attractive pricing. Winnipeg-based Farmers Edge is one of a number of companies hoping to profit from new technology by packaging data solutions […] Read more