Reading Time: 6 minutes Things were a little off with Harvest 2016 and Chad Bown was desperate. The farmer from Ranfurly, Alta., was combining 14 per cent moisture canola in late November after a month or more of snow delays. Delivery locations were full, so on-farm storage was his only option. But aeration fans blowing cool air could not […] Read more
Turn up the heat on aeration fans when drying canola
Some growers grappling with a late harvest and high-moisture crops in 2016 added supplemental heaters to their aeration fans. This grower’s experience may inspire an upgrade to aeration setups for 2017
VIDEO: Curbing clubroot in Ontario canola
Reading Time: < 1 minute During a recent canola growers’ day at Arthur, Ont., Dan Orchard, an agronomist with the Canola Council of Canada, brought his years of experience managing clubroot in Alberta to Ontario growers. Canola fields affected by clubroot were first found last year in Ontario. With some diligence, Orchard said, the problem should be able to be […] Read more
Greig: Centre backs Ontario canola growers’ push for profitability
Reading Time: 5 minutes A Canola Learning Centre has been created to try to solve some of the challenges Ontario farmers have growing consistent, profitable canola. Canola is now the largest crop grown in Canada, this year overtaking wheat, but in Ontario canola acres have been decreasing, by about a third in the past five years, to 40,000 acres, […] Read more
A giant leap for soil kind
Soil-health advocates like Jocelyn Velestuk look forward to new technology to help make better decisions to improve both soil health and whole-farm profitability
Reading Time: 4 minutes Jocelyn Velestuk did a lot of spitting the first time she met her future father-in-law. It made a lasting impression. As she describes it, Velestuk and her then fiancé and his father were touring around the farm she would soon marry into. Being a soil scientist, Velestuk scooped up handfuls of topsoil here and there, […] Read more
Are you ready to scout for and control flea beetles?
Flea beetles move fast and do a lot of damage. Be sure to keep ahead of them in your canola crops
Reading Time: 3 minutes Flea beetles are easily the most chronically damaging insect pest in western Canadian canola. Damage results in yield losses estimated at $300 million each year. To limit damage, experts recommend acting early when an average level of defoliation level of 25 per cent or more is reached. Early action necessary According to Greg Sekulic, an […] Read more
Four canola diseases to watch for
Be ready to recognize these major diseases in your canola crop this summer
Reading Time: 6 minutes Is that canola crop afflicted by blackleg, root rot, both, or something else entirely? It’s a messy question farmers and agronomists encounter every year. Presenters tried to untangle those problems at CanoLAB in Vermilion this winter. Here are four diseases to watch for in canola fields this summer, and tips on diagnosing them. 1. Blackleg […] Read more
Four canola diseases to watch for
Is that canola crop afflicted by blackleg, root rot, both, or something else entirely? It’s a messy question farmers and agronomists encounter every year. Presenters tried to untangle those problems at CanoLAB in Vermilion this winter. Here are four diseases to watch for in canola fields this summer, and tips on diagnosing them.
Clubroot calls for diligence, not alarm
The surprise discovery of clubroot in Ontario will force canola growers to adapt to the disease now in order to avoid future complications
Reading Time: 6 minutes In the mid-2000s, Albert Tenuta raised a few eyebrows when he referred to the discovery of soybean cyst nematode east of Toronto as good news. The field crops pathologist with the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) meant that once the pest was identified, it could be monitored, and growers could better[...]
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A nutrient-deficiency flare-up in canola
Everything goes along smoothly for decades, and the same old fertilizer combo produces the same old predicable results. Then soil levels for a particular nutrient dip below the critical threshold and plants grow funny and yields go askew. It happens
Reading Time: 5 minutes Jack Wood noticed strange patches of stunted canola in a field in 2013. By swathing time, those patches were clearly messed up. Pods were short and deformed. Stalks were skinny, and in the resulting windrows, the yield monitor dropped from 40 to just five bu./ac. One adviser said it was heat blast. Wood wasn’t so[...]
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Comfort builds for straight combining canola
New research and grower experiences are answering important questions about straight combining canola in Western Canada. Comfort with the practice rises as more growers explore where and when it might work and how to improve results
Reading Time: 6 minutes Dale Beutler of Whitewood, Sask. did not have a good first experience straight combining canola. It was 2015. Like many canola fields in the area that year, the one he left standing for straight combining had been reseeded and was late. By the first week of October, stems were still green —even though seeds were[...]
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A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
