Challenging Start To Spring Seeding On The Prairies

May 15, 2020

Spring seeding operations are slowly getting underway as some farmers wrap up the harvest.

Bill Huber has a mixed livestock operation in the Lipton area, northeast of Regina, and is one of many producers trying to finish the harvest and get this year's crop in the ground.

"It's going and it's going slow. It just depends on where you are there are places in our municipality and surrounding municipality that are a little drier than others and then there are areas that are extremely wet. It's causing some extreme difficulty in trying to get the crop off. It's been a challenge since last fall's rains in late August and September."

He's got about a thousand acres of Canola and Spring Wheat to take off, noting the crop is in fairly good shape.

"The quality isn't much different than last fall, we've lost a little in bushel weight but other than that it's better than we expected. It's just extremely wet and we've got to have guys around to pull you out."

Meantime, Saskatchewan Agriculture's Weekly Crop Report shows about 18 per cent of the Provincial crop is seeded, up from 7 per cent last week.

Saskatchewan's Ministry of Agriculture Crop Report is available here.

Alberta Agriculture reporting a slow start to seeding as well, many areas in the Province still finishing up the harvest.

The south has pretty much wrapped up the harvest, while the Northwest and Peace areas are the furthest behind.

Over 70 per cent of the 2019 cereal crop (spring wheat, barley and oats) is coming off as good quality feed.

Spring harvested Canola is also good quality with 84 per cent coming off as #3 Canada or better.

Seeding operations are slightly behind the average for this year with good progress being made in the South and Central Areas of the Province.

Planting in the North East, North West and Peace areas is a little further behind.

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