(Alberta Farmer Express photo by Jennifer Blair)

Clubroots beating all resistant canolas across Alta.

Reading Time: 2 minutes A study of 27 canola fields across Alberta has found 16 infected with clubroot pathotypes able to cause “high levels” of the disease — in canola plants with clubroot-resistant genetics. What’s more, the clubroot pathogen isolated from “many” of the infected fields in the study was virulent on all clubroot-resistant canola cultivars, the Canola Council of Canada […] Read more

Root rot in pea plants

Root rot disease could become the clubroot of pulse crops

For pulse growers, aphanomyces has all too much in common with canola’s clubroot

Reading Time: 3 minutes Nervous eyes are watching it, and voices are already whispering that it may become the clubroot of pulse crops. Aphanomyces is a virulent root rot, technically classified as a water mould, and it appears to be slowly spreading throughout the Prairie region, affecting annual and perennial legumes including legume forages. First confirmed in Saskatchewan in […] Read more


mature winter wheat stand

Your soil needs crop diversity

Stacked rotations may be worth more research, but until then, diversity is your best profit management tool

Reading Time: 4 minutes Healthy soil is the craziest, busiest jungle you can imagine. One gram of clubroot-infested soil can have a billion clubroot spores. A billion! All in a pinch of soil the size of a Skittle! Fusariums, pythiums, rhizoctonia and countless other beneficial fungi, bacteria and microbes are there, too. So are ions and molecules of calcium, […] Read more

clubroot in canola

The threat for canola

Two canola diseases have got researchers worried

Reading Time: 4 minutes Protecting any crop from plant diseases that lurk in the soil or in the stubble is a never ending battle for farmers and researchers. Often, however, it’s even worse in canola, as becomes clear with a quick look at clubroot and blackleg. Both attack canola and while scientists and farmers are doing their best to […] Read more


CS2000, shown here in field trials in August 2014, is billed as having “intermediate” resistance to the recently-discovered clubroot pathotype 5x. (BehindTheSeeds.ca)

Against clubroot, ‘I’-rated canola sits between ‘R’ and ‘S’

Reading Time: 2 minutes A new canola variety billed with “intermediate” reaction against a new pathotype of clubroot is being placed in the zone between “resistant” and “susceptible.” Canterra Seeds, the Winnipeg firm marketing the new CS2000 hybrid variety, clarified its claim for the seed in a statement on a company blog Wednesday, granting many growers may be seeing the […] Read more

CS2000, shown here in field trials in August 2014, is billed as having “intermediate” resistance to the recently-discovered clubroot pathotype 5x. (BehindTheSeeds.ca)

Canola variety’s clubroot claim taken with caution

Reading Time: 2 minutes A new variety of canola with “intermediate” resistance to a new type of clubroot may be cause for optimism, but Alberta’s canola grower group says farmers need to know more before they buy. The Alberta Canola Producers Commission (ACPC) warned Monday that growers will need more specifics about claims that a new canola variety has […] Read more


(Canola Council of Canada photo)

Manitoba canola pest lab backed for equipment, research

Reading Time: 2 minutes A new Manitoba lab with federal, provincial and canola industry backing has been opened with the goal of staying a step ahead of canola diseases such as clubroot and verticillium wilt. The federal and Manitoba governments on Thursday announced $969,000 for equipment, including a polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) machine, and $250,000 for research at the […] Read more

Last summer’s leached spikelets could mean a poor start for this year’s wheat crop.

2015 crop disease outlook

The 2014 growing season saw some serious disease 
outbreaks, and it looks like 2015 will too

Reading Time: 7 minutes Crops diseases are always a risk for grain growers. Be it rust in the 1950s, fusarium in the 1990s or clubroot today, it seems there’s always a new pestilence lurking just around the corner. Country Guide spoke to crop disease specialists from the three Prairie provinces late this fall about what they saw in the […] Read more


Clubroot control strategies do work, but the learning process is still underway.

The do’s and don’ts of clubroot

Specific, timely actions can help prevent the spread of disease in your soil

Reading Time: 2 minutes By now it’s clear. Some control strategies work. Others, says Dan Orchard, just don’t. Pulling plants from dead patches at the end of the season and looking for the disease certainly worked. But it would have worked even better if the recommendation right from the start had been to pull plants and check the roots. […] Read more

Joining the clubroot club

Joining the clubroot club

The disease is escaping beyond its Edmonton hot zone, and the rest of the Prairie region must get its response right

Reading Time: 11 minutes As you drive throughout the region surrounding Edmonton, canola is inescapable. It’s absolutely everywhere. And looking at the crops, it’s easy to understand why. With long days, cool nights and adequate rainfall, this is canola country pure and simple, and in most seasons, the crop flourishes under nearly ideal conditions. Canola has also been a crop […] Read more