Manitoba Fall Rye Harvest Set to Begin

Jul 31, 2024

Warm temperatures continued to accelerate crop development across Manitoba this past week, with the earliest fall rye fields expected to begin coming off this week.

The latest weekly crop report on Tuesday said fall rye and winter wheat are drying down with fields between hard dough and physiological maturity.

Meanwhile, most corn fields are between V10 to silking; and while many corn fields remain uneven, the problem has improved with the warm weather in the last few weeks, the report said.

“Continued warm temperatures are needed to further even out the crop.”

Spring wheat ranges from the soft dough to hard dough growth stages with awns starting to turn colour. There has been no change in spring wheat quality from the previous week. Spring wheat quality is rated mostly fair to good with 5 to 10% of the crop being reported as poor in the Southwest, Northwest, Central, and Interlake regions.

The earliest seeded canola crops are well into pod filling with flower drop complete. However, increased flower blast due to warm temperatures was noted by producers and agronomists.

Sunflower growth progressed rapidly in the warm conditions with stands ranging from R3 (bud elongation) to R5.1 (10% flowering) with most plants being at the R4 (inflorescence opening) growth stage. Soybeans are in the R2 (full bloom) to R3 (beginning pod) stage with the most advanced fields now at full pod (R4).

Field peas are in the R4 to R5 stage. For the most part, fields are looking good, however, there are fields affected by the excess moisture and doing poorly, most notably in the Eastern region.

Southwest:

Little to no rain has been observed in the area over the past week. The weather has been unusually calm, with temperatures above normal. Large creeks are flowing, but small creeks are not. There is no standing water in low spots. Smoke was again present in some areas during this week.

Northwest:

Hot and humid conditions persisted most of the week and continued to advance crops in the region. Highest temperature was 31.4°C at the Drifting River station and lowest overnight temperatures was 8.7°C at San Clara station. Most of the region received little to no precipitation, with the except of Reedy Creek station which received 44 mm.

Click here to see more...

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.”