Saskatchewan Agriculture reports hot weather over the past week has sped up crop development but is stressing crops in the drier areas of the province.
Saskatchewan Agriculture released its crop report yesterday for the period from July 21st to 27th. Tyce Masich, a crops extension specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture, says over the past week it's been hot and humid with not a lot rain.
Quote-Tyce Masich-Saskatchewan Agriculture:
The hot conditions, the hot temperatures have been the biggest source of crop stress this past week. It's affected oilseed, pulse and cereal crops. The hot temperatures have been the biggest factor and in some areas of the province, like in the east-central and northeast parts of the province, canola is still flowering in those areas.
Canola is very susceptible to damage from heat when it's flowering so it definitely might have had an impact on crops in those areas.In terms of other loss we might have seen from last week specifically, there wasn't a lot other than just the heat and then in the northern parts of the province, there were scattered thunderstorms that brought strong winds that caused some crop lodging here and there.
Parts of the northeast are still dealing with excess moisture in certain parts of their fields, mainly low-lying areas, which again is contributing to crop stress and potential yield loss from that. In terms of insects that are out right now, there really aren't any that are causing too much crop damage other than just some isolated cases of Cabbage seed pod weevil and pea aphids in southern and western regions.
But again, those reports are pretty few and far between in terms of damaging crops.The thing that producers and agronomists are going to be on the lookout for over the next week and the weeks after that is bertha armyworms, because there have been some high counts of Bertha armyworms in the province leading up to this and now that it's time for them to start feeding on the crop, we might see some spray go down in the coming weeks.But I guess we just have to wait and see what comes about that.
Masich says producers are starting to get harvest equipment out of the sheds and getting ready for harvest, especially in the southern regions where the crops are more advanced.
Source : Farmscape.ca