The 4th annual Alberta Young Speakers for Agriculture competition has come and gone at the Calgary Stampede. The competition provides Albertan youth ages 11-24 with an opportunity to speak up for agriculture through a little healthy competition, with opportunity to further on into the national competition (Canadian Young Speakers for Agriculture) held during the Royal… Read More
CanolaPALOOZA is an event held across the Prairies that tackles all things canola agronomy — and more. Covering everything from pre-emergence to post-harvest, marketing, and more, canolaPALOOZA offers three separate days of learning in three provinces. The summer can often be filled with field days and trade shows, so the goal of the event is… Read More
A new fertilizer spreader launched by Amazone, and shown at Canada’s Farm Progress Show, may grab the attention of producers looking for an upgrade. The spreader, which can be used as a trailed unit, or mounted onto a self-propelled unit, uses a drop-point as a shutter to control how wide the granular fertilizer is spread…. Read More
Rural crime is an unfortunate term we’ve all come to know — whether we’ve encountered it ourselves, or had a neighbour in the area deal with an incident. The question always is, what do we do about it? What is within the farmers’ rights when it comes to other people trespassing and stealing property? Moose… Read More
Public speaking. For you 4-H-ers out there, you’ve probably competed in an agricultural-based public speaking competition before, whether it was to your excitement, or you were doing it because it was mandatory in your district. Growing up outside of the 4-H sphere, and not living in a big centre, these were skills I didn’t really… Read More
If you’re in Western Canada, you are most likely looking forward to one of the crop tour highlights of the summer: canolaPALOOZA. Hosted and organized by the three canola organizations across the prairies — Alberta Canola, SaskCanola, and Manitoba Canola Growers — canolaPALOOZA brings three days of education, and fun across the prairies on three… Read More
My name is Kara Oosterhuis, and I’m RealAgriculture’s newest field editor, covering Alberta and Saskatchewan. You may recognize that mouthful of my last name as I spent some time with the team a couple summers back, chasing CanolaPaloozas, agronomic schools, field days, and everything in between. Most memorably, I put on over 3,500km on my… Read More
Over the past couple of decades, those who make a profit off of the environment — farmers, ranchers, miners, and loggers — have seen a fair amount of negative publicity. As people involved in some of these industries, we know the negativity isn’t always accurate, and Bruce Vincent with Environomics Incorporated more than agrees. “The… Read More
In this episode of Wheat Pete’s Word, RealAg Agronomist Peter Johnson expresses his confusion and concern for FROST! Oh man! It’s time to seed the “crop of all crops”, winter wheat! Find out what tips he has for you. He also adds a quick note about fusarium in wheat and gibberella in corn. Listen to… Read More
A Saskatchewan rancher has pleaded guilty to possession of stolen property after police seized $1.2 million worth of stolen farm equipment last year, including tractors, balers, and trucks. 39 year old Iain Stables was originally facing 29 charges, and as of Monday, has pleaded guilty to 18 of those. The charges stem from a search… Read More
When penciling out the cost of replacement heifers, it’s easy to think of all of the obvious costs, the cash costs. But Kathy Larson, research economist with the Western Beef Development Centre, encourages producers to consider the opportunity costs of raising animals as well. “Opportunity costs are essentially non-cash costs. The biggest one being the money… Read More
There are certain parts to a beef cow that consumers tend to migrate to, with most of them being the centre cuts — sirloin, prime rib, and others we see at restaurants and in stores. The Canadian Beef Centre of Excellence, located in Calgary, AB, is looking to show food service operators, chefs, and domestic/international… Read More
Richardson Pioneer Limited is continuing to grow, with the acquisition of two new crop input facilities in northeastern Alberta — Webb’s Crop Services Ltd. in Vermilion, AB and Agro Guys Inc. near Forestburg, AB. The employees will join the Richardson Pioneer team on September 1, providing customers with crop inputs products and services in local areas…. Read More
Livestock producers in Western Canada now have access to a new medication system that will ensure accuracy, as well as help track medication given to their animals. The system, which was announced at the Canadian Beef Industry Conference last week, is made up of an auto-dosing tool that tracks and records what, when, and the… Read More
The canola pods are almost done filling, if not at full maturity, in many areas of the prairies, and harvest is beginning. We often think of scouting as something we have to do earlier in the season when there are still control options, but don’t always remember the importance of knowing what’s going on in… Read More