Manitoba Update

   Whether the weather will be right...

  That's always the question when planning and planting a crop for whatever part of the world you live in...  Whether the weather will be right...  too cold, too windy,  too hot,  too dry,  too wet, unpredictable timing of rains,  hail, frost, hurricanes, tornadoes, flooding, extended periods of fog...   all of these things and more can and do effect the successful or unsuccessful results of the harvest.  For most its an annual event and an annual gamble.   This year in Manitoba we have been worried all summer about too little rain and too much heat.   There was lots of moisture in the soil last fall and good snow cover in the winter.  The crop was seeded into good conditions with just a little rain to start the crop off.  Being quite dry in the spring forced the roots of the crops to dig down and search for moisture.  Roots have the ability to go down a couple of feet to absorb moisture and also the nutrients carried through that water.  Farmers and agronomists were worried about low yields because of not enough rain... The dry weather lasted most of the summer and fall until this weekend ! Most people in the area have been having a wonderful surprise when they pulled into the wheat fields.  The bushels were rolling in better than many have ever had in their farming careers !  The establishment of the root systems early allowed the plants to survive and thrive in this environment !  In this area we often have a disease in the wheat called fusarium.  This reduces the yield somewhat and the value and makes it much more difficult to market.  A wheat crop has flowers ( believe it or not ) and if the disease is in the soil or the seed and if you get rainfall during the flowering stage it makes the infection rate go up dramatically.  All in all having the dry growing season this year with the moisture in the soil from 2016 made for a wonderful healthy big yielding wheat crop !    As one farmer said..." If we could have picked the weather we would have got it wrong this year !    We will be able to help more people in Africa than we expected this year !   Stay tuned...
Ray the Grain Guy