Let's start here: not all tillage is unwarranted. In some soils and circumstances, tillage can help warm, dry, or prepare a seedbed before planting and can help bury trash that is otherwise tough for a seeder to get through. At times, burial of residues can provide a larger surface area for microbes within different soil... Read More
Category: Crop Production
It’s been more than 30 years since Caterpillar launched the first tracked tractor for farming. A lot has changed since those first basic tracks and under carriages rolled into farm fields. Most of those early tractors were in the 200 to 400 horsepower range. In the past decade however, many of those smaller tractors are... Read More
As of this week, the Ontario government is expanding its workplace safety COVID-19-compliance blitz to more businesses, including farms. The campaign began last week focused on big-box retail stores. More than 300 provincial officers will now be focusing on retail, restaurants providing take-out, gas stations, and farms, among other essential businesses. Officers will enter businesses... Read More
With consultations underway for the Responsible Grain code of practice, farmers are expressing varied levels of support and frustration towards the concept. Echo chambers have developed on both sides of the issue, with what I perceive to be the majority of farmers in the middle looking for facts and understanding of what Responsible Grain is... Read More
John Deere's newest combine received high praise from the innovation award judges at the 2021 Consumer Electronics Show last week. Normally held in Las Vegas in early January, this year's version of CES was held virtually. The X Series combine received the top award — the "Best of Innovation" seal — in the robotics category,... Read More
Farmers are getting vocal about the Responsible Grain code of practice, whether it's in support or dissent. Up until now, those voices have primarily been western Canadian in origin, but the code potentially impacts Ontario and points east, too. Crosby Devitt, CEO of Grain Farmers of Ontario (GFO), recently joined Shaun Haney to help us... Read More
If you're looking for the magic formula to growing great wheat, you've come to the right place. In this week's Wheat Pete's Word, host Peter Johnson sums up how the soybean year finished off yield-wise for Ontario, why corn yields failed to impress, and then he digs in to the best crop ever — wheat!... Read More
What's the secret to growing those gigantic corn yields that turn a select few U.S. farmers into corn yield contest kings? Purdue University corn guru Dr. Bob Nielsen has been pouring over National Corn Yield Contest data and crop input and management summaries from winners for almost two decades. What has he learned? After all... Read More
Consultations are in full swing for the Responsible Grain code of practice, and the process is facing some bumps in the road. While the initiative is similar to what the beef industry went through with the Canadian Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, it's not the same; and many farmers are expressing concern over whether or not... Read More
Jenneth Johanson farms in an atypical growing region at Lac du Bonnet, Man., about 100 km northeast of Winnipeg. She farms on productive land where the eastern Prairie meets the Canadian Shield, some of which is classified as organic soil: peat. Farming on peat has its challenges: it has low water holding capacity, it's high... Read More