After an overly wet and cool start to the spring, the weather in Ontario has flipped to the opposite.
As the map below shows, the taps have turned off across a good portion of the province, particularly from Toronto and eastward, which as seen as little as less than 40% of normal precipitation over the past month. Relatively more rain has fallen west from London.
In an interview Tuesday, independent agronomist Gilles Quesnel, who is based in Winchester, ON., said farmers in the eastern reaches of the province are understandably worried about the recent lack of rainfall but added the situation certainly isn’t critical yet.
“Everybody is getting a bit concerned but there’s very little irreversible damage,” he said.
One of the saving graces, Quesnel said, is the fact most of the spring seeded crops went into the ground relatively early, which allowed them to emerge before the worst of the dryness hit. A few fields of later planted soybeans still haven’t come up, but there is still plenty of time for that to happen, he said, noting the seed in the ground still remains viable.
Corn crops in the eastern part of the province are a little shorter and not progressing as quickly as normal, he said, but have plenty of opportunity to get caught back up as well.
Quesnel admitted the dryness – and the heat that has accompanied it in the past couple of weeks – will take a toll on any winter wheat crops that happen to be heading, although very little winter wheat is grown east of Kingston anyway.
At this point, the only real impact of the hot, dry conditions in eastern Ontario has been financial, Quesnel said, with some of the pre-emergent herbicides that were applied not able to get the moisture they need to start working. That may force some farmers to make a second pass, although most were likely planning on doing so regardless, he said.
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