Winter Wheat Benefiting From Spring Rains

Jun 03, 2020

For the most part, Manitoba's winter wheat crop is coming along nicely.

Ken Gross is an agrologist with Ducks Unlimited.

"So far, we're pretty happy with the fields that we're working with in southwestern Manitoba here," he said. "We had some rains recently and we didn't get those the last two years and so the crop is looking pretty good. There are spots, I know around Selkirk, that haven't got the rains yet and maybe even a touch of the frost, so those ones are not performing quite as well but they're hanging on."

Gross says most of the winter wheat in the southwest is still in the tillering stage (3-5 leaf). Further east the crop is starting to joint.

He notes the recent frost didn't do a lot of damage to the winter wheat, but may have set it back a little bit.

Some regions could use another half inch to an inch of rain.

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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.