Reading Time: 5 minutes What is it about weeds? No matter how hard you try to eradicate them, they always come back. Worse still, each method of weed control has its drawbacks. Spraying with herbicides can lead to weed resistance if the same product is used continuously. Tillage can result in soil erosion (remember the Dirty ’30s?), and although […] Read more
Controlling crop weeds with beneficial insects
Flea beetles that eat leafy spurge are only the first wave of biological weed control
Fungicide resistance creeping up in crops
Fortunately, we already have many of the tools we need to delay or stop resistance in its tracks
Reading Time: 5 minutes We hear a lot about herbicide-resistant weeds these days. Repeated use of herbicides, especially ones from the same group and with similar modes of action, promotes the growth of weed populations that the chemicals can no longer control. A prime example is the emergence of weeds resistant to glyphosate, the most widely used weed control […] Read more
The West’s big challenge for soybeans
Soybean Guide: Despite their province’s soaring soy acreage, Manitoba’s hog industry is still locked into expensive imported soymeal. Worse, change may still be years away
Reading Time: 5 minutes It was another banner year for Manitoba soybeans in 2014 with production hitting a record 1.1 million tonnes, up 3.7 per cent from 2013. Figures from Statistics Canada show that, although average yields dropped 14 per cent to 32.3 bushels per acre, a 21 per cent increase in harvested area more than made up for […] Read more
Weed management. It’s time to get ahead before it’s too late
With herbicide resistance on the rise, is integrated weed management an idea whose time has finally arrived?
Reading Time: 5 minutes If you want to know how bad weed resistance can get, ask the cotton farmers of Georgia about Palmer amaranth. From a single field in Macon County in 2005, glyphosate-resistant Palmer amaranth has exploded across the southern U.S. Cotton Belt. A member of the pigweed family, Palmer amaranth has seriously affected weed management in cotton […] Read more
The West’s new Cinderella
Corn acres are surging across the West. Is it time for you to get on board?
Reading Time: 5 minutes Although widespread throughout southern Ontario and the U.S., corn is a crop you don’t normally associate with the colder Canadian Prairies. But don’t tell that to Monsanto, which is investing $100 million to develop early-maturing hybrids that the company hopes could make corn the new star in the West. “I think there’ll be millions of […] Read more
1.6 million acres of Prairie soybeans
Manitoba’s soybean acres have exploded in 2014, and Saskatchewan farmers are close behind
Reading Time: 6 minutes You can’t accuse Ernie Sirski of doing things by halves. In fact, he does them by twos, at least when it comes to soybeans. In 2012, Sirski planted 200 acres of soybeans for the first time on his farm near Dauphin, Man. The next year, he doubled that to 400 acres, averaging an impressive 40 […] Read more
Sustainability special: Saving Iowa
Stronger commodity prices are threatening many soils. But not on every farm
Reading Time: 4 minutes The topsoil of one of America’s largest agricultural-producing states is vanishing at an alarming rate, with wind and water erosion directly linked to the cropping practices and to the fencerow-to-fencerow philosophy that farmers have turned to in order to cash in on high prices for corn, soybeans and other crops. Around Iowa’s western and southern […] Read more
Increase in conservation agriculture ‘has to happen’
Only 7.1 per cent of the world’s arable land is farmed no till, and there are many reasons to adopt practices
Reading Time: 4 minutes If conservation agriculture is so great, why aren’t more farmers doing it? It’s a question that surfaced repeatedly during panel discussions at the recent World Congress on Conservation Agriculture in Winnipeg. Presenters from countries spanning the alphabet from Australia to Zambia left little doubt that conservation agriculture is a worldwide movement. Zero tillage is growing […] Read more
See the future
Wayne Wikkerink didn’t get into the dairy business. Thanks to Growing Forward, he did something even better
Reading Time: 4 minutes That phrase “If you build it, they will come” may have worked for Kevin Costner, who played a farmer in the movie “Field of Dreams” but it’s a high-risk strategy for farmers in real life. Instead of heading off into the unknown, any farmer looking to try something different on the farm wants first to […] Read moreManitoba Interlake ranchers face desperate situation
Reading Time: 4 minutes Updated, May 12 — Cattle producers in Manitoba’s Interlake are frantically trying to move their herds out of the Lake Manitoba region this week after receiving emergency evacuation warnings because of rising flood waters. Producers in nearly a dozen municipalities around the lower basin of Lake Manitoba have been put on evacuation alert for as […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
