Yield estimates reveal glaring discrepancy

Sep 30, 2022

Saskatchewan’s crops look better from the sky than they do from the ground.

Statistics Canada used satellite-based vegetative growth maps to determine crop yields in its August principal field crop estimates report published on Sept. 14.

By contrast, Saskatchewan Agriculture used a boots-on-the-ground approach to determine yields as of Sept. 5.

The different methodologies resulted in a sizable discrepancy, with the federal government’s forecast being substantially higher than the province’s for nearly every crop.

For instance, Statistics Canada’s hard red spring wheat, durum and canola estimates were higher by 4.8, 6.0 and 3.8 bushels per acre respectively. Using the province’s seeded acreage estimates, that would result in an extra 1.09 million tonnes of hard red spring wheat, 794,366 tonnes of durum and 981,957 tonnes of canola.

Those are market-moving numbers.

Barley and flax are the only two crops where the federal and provincial governments appear to be in lockstep.

Matthew Struthers, crops extension specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture, is confident in the yield estimates compiled from 200 crop reporters scattered across the province.

“We get our information from crop reporters, so we get it from people right on the ground,” he said. “They do a great job and I stand with the information we have in the report.”

John Seay, unit head for Statistics Canada’s crop reporting unit, is equally convinced about the accuracy of his numbers.

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Video: Spring 2026 weather outlook for Wisconsin; What an early-arriving El Niño could mean

Northeast Wisconsin is a small corner of the world, but our weather is still affected by what happens across the globe.

That includes in the equatorial Pacific, where changes between El Niño and La Niña play a role in the weather here -- and boy, have there been some abrupt changes as of late.

El Niño and La Niña are the two phases of what is collectively known as the El Niño Southern Oscillation, or ENSO for short. These are the swings back and forth from unusually warm to unusually cold sea surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean along the equator.

Since this past September, we have been in a weak La Niña, which means water temperatures near the Eastern Pacific equator have been cooler than usual. That's where we're at right now.

Even last fall, the long-term outlook suggested a return to neutral conditions by spring and potentially El Niño conditions by summer.

But there are some signs this may be happening faster than usual, which could accelerate the onset of El Niño.

Over the last few weeks, unusually strong bursts of westerly winds farther west in the Pacific -- where sea surface temperatures are warmer than average -- have been observed. There is a chance that this could accelerate the warming of those eastern Pacific waters and potentially push us into El Niño sooner than usual.

If we do enter El Nino by spring -- which we'll define as the period of March, April and May -- there are some long-term correlations with our weather here in Northeast Wisconsin.

Looking at a map of anomalously warm weather, most of the upper Great Lakes doesn't show a strong correlation, but in general, the northern tiers of the United States do tend to lean to that direction.

The stronger correlation is with precipitation. El Niño conditions in spring have historically come with a higher risk of very dry weather over that time frame, so this will definitely be a transition we'll have to watch closely as we move out of winter.