It's back to school....

Jul 27, 2022

Saskatchewan's Crop Diagnostic School kicked off yesterday in Swift Current.

The two day event continues today for pre-registered participants.

Crops Extension Specialist Allie Noble says this year's event gives producers, agronomists, industry and retail staff from across the province the opportunity to take part in training sessions focusing on everything from crop scouting to agronomics.

Participants are going through five different stations covering a variety of topics ranging from weeds, to disease and insects, herbicide injury and soils.

The soil station with Dr Jeff Schoenau and Ken Wall focuses on how higher levels of seed placed nitrogen can affect seedling survival, and how different crops can tolerate varying levels of salinity.

The weed identification station focuses on commonly found and misidentified broadleaf and grassy weeds as well as information on noxious weeds and weed seed longevity.

The disease station covers a lot of ground from chickpea issues with Dr. Michelle Hubbard to Dr. Sabine Banniza on root rots in pulses. Dr. Alireza Akhavan focused on verticillium stripe in canola, Dr. Randy Kutcher spoke on cereal diseases while Dr. Dean Malvick talked about Goss’s Wilt and Tar Spot in corn.

At the insect station, Dr. James Tansey along with AAFC Scientists Dr. Meghan Vankosky and Dr. Tyler Wist focus on how to identify and properly scout for insects that you might find across Saskatchewan.

Provincial Weed Control Specialist Clark Brenzil walks participants through herbicide injury symptoms and what to look for on cereals, oilseeds and pulses.

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Video: Evolution of Beef Cattle Farming

The Clear Conversations podcast took to the road for a special episode recorded in Nashville during CattleCon, bringing listeners straight into the heart of the cattle industry. Host Tracy Sellers welcomed rancher Steve Wooten of Beatty Canyon Ranch in Colorado for a wide-ranging discussion that blended family history and sustainability, particularly as it relates to the future of beef production.

Sustainability emerged as a central theme of the conversation, a word that Wooten acknowledges can mean very different things depending on who you ask. For him, sustainability starts with the soil. Healthy soil produces healthy grass, which supports efficient cattle capable of producing year after year with minimal external inputs. It’s an approach that equally considers vegetation, animal efficiency, and long-term profitability.

That philosophy aligned naturally with Wooten’s involvement in the U.S. Roundtable for Sustainable Beef, where he served as a representative for the Colorado Cattlemen’s Association. The roundtable brings together the entire beef supply chain—from producers to retailers—along with universities, NGOs, and allied industries. Its goal is not regulation, Wooten emphasized, but collaboration, shared learning, and continuous improvement.