Sometimes, the best thing you can do is ask for help, especially when trying something completely new. In the fall of 1974 brothers Allan and Murray Calder had finished the harvest on the family’s farm near Letellier, Man.
With a bit of time on their hands they decided to take a road trip to look for a new piece of equipment they knew they were going to need if they wanted to get serious about the newest crop on their farm, just 6-1/2 miles north of the 49th parallel in the Red River Valley.
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The crop in question was corn, and Allan says he’d first become interested in it after seeing it on a field tour during his days at the University of Manitoba, where he studied agriculture. When he returned to the farm in 1971 he knew he wanted to try to grow it.
Initially it was intended for silage for the cattle the family then kept on the operation, but in the fall of 1973 the Calders tried an experiment and left three acres that they harvested for grain. The initial experiment was a success and the following year they expanded the grain harvest to cover 40 acres.
After that fall the brothers concluded that grain corn could not only be grown in the region, it could be done well and could be an economic success. But that meant they’d need to start acquiring the specialized equipment necessary to successfully grow and harvest the crop — and in this case the most pressing need was a corn header for the combine.
The pair jumped into the car and headed south down the Red River Valley, visiting machinery dealerships along the way. Eventually they found themselves in northern Iowa, where they continued their quest — but they decided to add a new wrinkle. They got off the Interstate highway system and started travelling some of the paved secondary roads, with an eye to talking to local farmers and gaining some insight into the new crop.
“What we did is we’d see a prosperous-looking farm, we’d stop and knock on the door,” Allan explained. “We told the guys down there, ‘We’re from 500 miles north of here and we want to grow corn. We’d like to know what you do.’”
To say the Iowans were a bit surprised by the visitors might be a bit of an understatement, says Allan.
“They just couldn’t believe that we were thinking of growing corn here — though I think it was as astounding to us as it was to them on the other side,” Calder says. “We were green and we knew very little.”
Putting their initial surprise aside, the Iowa farmers quickly showed the Manitobans some farm hospitality and were more than happy to talk shop over coffee and cake.
As a strategy, it worked. The Manitobans took back some valuable information that allowed them to harness their unique geographic and climatic advantages to expand their crop options.
