By Geoff Smith

Northwest finally gets rain as harvest begins

Aug 11, 2016 | 5:00 PM

Farmers in the northwest finally received some much needed rain, just as harvest gets underway.

The crop report for the period ending Aug. 8 said the region had a few reports of combining in pea fields, and swathing of oats. The west-central region is a little farther along, with 34 per cent of fall rye, three per cent of winter wheat, and one per cent of peas and lentils now combined.

Daphne Cruise, regional crops specialist with the Ministry of Agriculture, said the rain in the past week helped northwest farmers, but it’s been too much for the west-central district.

“Now that it’s harvest time – if we could turn the taps on and off when we wanted, wouldn’t that be great? But I think right now if the rain would stop it would allow producers to continue on with harvest operations and get things on the go,” she said.

Cando reported another 63 mm of rain during the week, Langham received 112 mm, and 56 mm dropped on Biggar. In the northwest, amounts included 46 mm at Glaslyn, 31 mm for Neilburg, 12 mm for Frenchman Butte, and nothing for Meadow Lake, Pierceland, and Speers, which has been the driest area in the entire province since April. At least 20 per cent of topsoil moisture in the area has less than adequate moisture, while the Rosetown-Kindersley district of west-central Saskatchewan has too much moisture in 62 per cent of its cropland.

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“I think in some cases, particularly in the pulses that just can’t handle this moisture and especially with these heavy downpours we’re seeing a lot of lodging in crops. And the pulses can’t handle a lot of that,” Cruise said. “The oilseeds and cereals seem to be standing up not too bad to it. But again, once a crop is pushed to the ground, like some of those short crops like the lentils and peas, then it’s going to make it difficult to pick those crops up.”

In the drier northwest, crops are reported in generally good condition, with good yields and quality expected.

Three quarters of the northwest hay crop is now baled, and another 12 per cent is cut. One third of the hay is reported in good quality, and the remainder is listed as fair. In west-central Saskatchewan haying is nearly complete with more than 90 per cent baled or in silage. Half of the hay crop there is reported as good, the other half fair.

Geoff Smith is battlefordsNOW’s News Director, business and agriculture reporter. He can be reached at geoff.smith@jpbg.ca or tweet him @smithco.