Reading Time: 5 minutes The fall objectives: Make sure the chopper can spread the width of the cut. Have a chaff spreader to avoid the thick harrow-immoveable mat of chaff right behind the combine. Cut higher so more of the residue is standing stubble. If necessary, harrow the crop on a hot windy day. This is the no-till approach […] Read more
Is strip tillage a residue solution?
We don’t want to see a step backward in reduced-tillage practices. So how can canola growers improve seed survival and crop uniformity in challenging residue situations?
Cure canola longer, harvest more
When canola swaths are cured and dry, combines put a lot more canola in the tank and a lot less on the ground
Reading Time: 4 minutes Kristen Phillips already knew that combines capture more available yield when canola is cured and dry, but she was still surprised when she was harvesting one set of Ultimate Canola Challenge (UCC) plots this fall. The Canola Council of Canada’s UCC program for 2016 aimed to help identify agronomically and economically optimal nitrogen (N) rates […] Read more
Blackleg and canola can get along… until
Keys to restoring a healthy relationship between blackleg and canola include wider rotations of both crops and canola varieties with different resistance genes
Reading Time: 4 minutes After hearing many presentations on blackleg in canola, I was confused. I heard that disease pathogens usually harm their host plant, but blackleg doesn’t necessarily. In fact, blackleg and brassica species such as canola usually get along. On the other hand, we know that blackleg is now a major problem. Why? University of Manitoba professor […] Read more
To spray or not to spray?
A preventive canola spray for sclerotinia can pay off, but not necessarily for blackleg
Reading Time: 5 minutes Keith Gabert rarely tells Alberta canola producers straight up not to spray fungicide as a preventive against sclerotinia stem rot. But last year, the Canola Council of Canada’s agronomy specialist for central Alberta south did just that. “In the Drumheller area, where they don’t always have as much moisture, they’d sprayed for sclerotinia in the […] Read more
Is stored canola at bigger risk than ever?
Huge bins, straight combining and delivery contracts for June and July have all potentially increased the storage risk for canola. But the basics for safe storage — eight per cent moisture, 15 C or less and regular monitoring — still apply
Reading Time: 4 minutes We don’t really know whether canola in a 25,000-bushel bin stores differently from canola in a 2,000-bushel bin. We don’t know if straight combining reduces or increases canola storage risk. And we don’t know the best way to store canola for 11 months through fall, winter, spring and summer weather changes. Given that many canola […] Read more
Proposed Chinese canola dockage rules worry Canadian industry
Reading Time: 3 minutes Commodity News Service Canada – It’s a nervous time for Canada’s canola industry as it lobbies the Chinese government over a plan to impose new dockage rules on imports of Canadian canola on Sept. 1. That’s when China’s quarantine agency, AQSIQ, says the dockage allowances for Canadian canola will be pegged at one per cent, down […] Read more
High disease risk sees many Manitoba canola growers spraying fungicide
A wet spring creates canola fields full of sclerotinia as flowering blooms
Reading Time: 3 minutes This season Manitoba canola growers shouldn’t be asking if they should be spraying fungicides — they should be asking themselves if there’s any possible reason they shouldn’t. Clinton Jurke, director of agronomy for the Canola Council of Canada, says it’s been a moist spring, yield looks good in much of the province and dense canopies […] Read more
Feeding the Indian tiger
Move over China. Food sales to India are set to roar
Reading Time: 5 minutes “The Indians are crazy for red lentils… potential sales are incredible,” says Lance Walker, head of Lazer Enterprises Inc. in Borden, Sask. Walker was working in a trade show booth as he told me this, one of the representatives of the 23 Canadian businesses that were participating at the 31st Aahar Food Hospitality Trade Fair […] Read more
Where crop spray chemical goes, clean those
When it comes to cleaning sprayers, the tank is just one target. Here are a few tips for better, faster clean-outs
Reading Time: 5 minutes Ken Munro’s sprayer clean-out strategy is to send tank cleaner wherever the chemical goes. “We start at the chemical inductor and go from there,” says Munro, who farms and works at Central Alberta Co-op’s Green Way Agro Centre in Innisfail. Just cleaning the tank isn’t good enough. Sprayer specialist Tom Wolf — @nozzle_guy — echoed […] Read more
10 steps to better on-farm experiments
Do you have a nagging agronomy question you want answered? Follow these steps to set up an on-farm trial and put that question to the test
Reading Time: 6 minutes Adam Gurr wanted to know if he could cut his canola-seeding rate and not sacrifice yield or extend maturity. So the Brandon, Man. farmer set up a three-year trial to answer the question. Gurr compared his usual seeding rate to one that was 20 per cent less and one that was 50 per cent less. […] Read more
A message from April Stewart, Country Guide's Associate Editor
