Farmers face possible propane delays

Oct 09, 2018

Poor field conditions and wet harvested grain stresses the propane industry’s fuel supply

By Kate Ayers
Staff Writer
Farms.com

The propane industry is struggling to keep up with the demand from more farmers drying their wet grain.

This harvest season is “a lot cooler, wetter and (these conditions are) more widespread than normal,” Keith Morin, director for Federated Co-operatives Ltd., said to Farms.com today.

“There are some pockets that have more moisture … than average throughout the Prairies, especially in Saskatchewan.”

And these conditions are forcing farmers to dry most of the crops they harvest, as the grain is coming off at a much higher moisture content than usual.

Last month in the Melfort, Sask. area, for example, the Co-op sold two-and-a-half times more propane than the 10-year average, Morin said in a CBC article yesterday.

“The propane industry is having difficulty trying to keep up with the spike in demand,” he said.

Although Melfort has been the busiest area this season, branches in Saskatoon, Yorkton and Meadow Lake have also experienced an up-tick in fuel demand.

Co-op branches in Edmonton and Grassland, Alta. have been busier than normal with grain drying as well.

In Manitoba, the company has been busy with farmers drying corn in the Brandon, Winnipeg and Carmen areas.

“For most of the locations we service for producers drying grain, it’s business as usual (with deliveries) within 48 hours,” Morin said to Farms.com.

However, “we do have some situations that are little bit more backed up based on the peak demand. The Melfort area in Northeastern Saskatchewan is our hardest hit area and the wait time for those customers right now is seven to 10 days.”

Farmers can order propane volumes based on the amount they can store on their farms.

Orientaly/Getty photo

Video: Why Your Food Future Could be Trapped in a Seed Morgue

In a world of PowerPoint overload, Rex Bernardo stands out. No bullet points. No charts. No jargon. Just stories and photographs. At this year’s National Association for Plant Breeding conference on the Big Island of Hawaii, he stood before a room of peers — all experts in the science of seeds — and did something radical: he showed them images. He told them stories. And he asked them to remember not what they saw, but how they felt.

Bernardo, recipient of the 2025 Lifetime Achievement Award, has spent his career searching for the genetic treasures tucked inside what plant breeders call exotic germplasm — ancient, often wild genetic lines that hold secrets to resilience, taste, and traits we've forgotten to value.

But Bernardo didn’t always think this way.

“I worked in private industry for nearly a decade,” he recalls. “I remember one breeder saying, ‘We’re making new hybrids, but they’re basically the same genetics.’ That stuck with me. Where is the new diversity going to come from?”

For Bernardo, part of the answer lies in the world’s gene banks — vast vaults of seed samples collected from every corner of the globe. Yet, he says, many of these vaults have quietly become “seed morgues.” “Something goes in, but it never comes out,” he explains. “We need to start treating these collections like living investments, not museums of dead potential.”

That potential — and the barriers to unlocking it — are deeply personal for Bernardo. He’s wrestled with international policies that prevent access to valuable lines (like North Korean corn) and with the slow, painstaking science of transferring useful traits from wild relatives into elite lines that farmers can actually grow. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. But he’s convinced that success starts not in the lab, but in the way we communicate.

“The fact sheet model isn’t cutting it anymore,” he says. “We hand out a paper about a new variety and think that’s enough. But stories? Plants you can see and touch? That’s what stays with people.”

Bernardo practices what he preaches. At the University of Minnesota, he helped launch a student-led breeding program that’s working to adapt leafy African vegetables for the Twin Cities’ African diaspora. The goal? Culturally relevant crops that mature in Minnesota’s shorter growing season — and can be regrown year after year.

“That’s real impact,” he says. “Helping people grow food that’s meaningful to them, not just what's commercially viable.”

He’s also brewed plant breeding into something more relatable — literally. Coffee and beer have become unexpected tools in his mission to make science accessible. His undergraduate course on coffee, for instance, connects the dots between genetics, geography, and culture. “Everyone drinks coffee,” he says. “It’s a conversation starter. It’s a gateway into plant science.”