If I buy the best golf club, am I the best golfer? By the same token, if someone plants a cover crop, are they taking better care of soil health than someone who doesn’t? Not necessarily, says Shaun Haney, founder of RealAgriculture and host of RealAg Radio. The trouble is, policy can be prescriptive (i.e.,… Read More
Here’s to hoping everyone had a great Easter weekend! We are excited to be back with another episode of The Agronomists. We’re hitting the ground running with this week’s topic: nitrogen management. More specifically, this episode is focused on managing N losses and products that potentially help reduce some of those losses. This week’s panel… Read More
The federal government rolled out its 2022 budget this week, and in it are several programs for agriculture, including funding for research, adaptation, carbon sequestration and more. One of those programs, the On-Farm Climate Action Fund, received a major cash boost, from just under $200 million to $469.5 million over six years, starting in 2022-23. Announced last… Read More
By John McGregor, extension support for Manitoba Forage and Grasslands Association Supply shortages have become almost the norm for most of us. From the infamous toilet paper shortage back in 2020 to hay shortages presently, living with and planning for supply disruptions are becoming all too common. On the agricultural side, we read about supply… Read More
How can you build soil organic matter? How long does it take and what’s the impact on yield? University of Guelph researcher Laura Van Eerd and Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs (OMAFRA) soil management specialist Anne Verhallen tackle these questions in this 2021 Ontario Diagnostic Days video report. The researchers visit Van Eerd’s… Read More
The science supporting what we know and don’t know about soil health, nutrient cycling, and soil microbes builds every year. Not long ago, much of the soil management narrative focused on keeping soil covered (don’t farm naked!) to minimize erosion risk and build soil. Now we know that while preventing or at least decreasing erosion… Read More
Two Manitoba groups have launched an initiative to connect livestock producers and grain producers through the Manitoba Grazing Exchange (MGE). The Manitoba Organic Alliance (MOA) and Manitoba Forage and Grassland Association (MFGA) says the grazing exchange website is designed to make it easier for livestock producers to connect with grain producers who have available grazing pasture or cover crop fields…. Read More
What’s in that snoil? That’s snow and soil, in case you’re wondering (AKA snirt). That’s that “little” skiff of brown or black snow in ditches and in fact, there’s a heck of a lot of good stuff in that snoil. From nutrients to organic matter, top soil moved by wind erosion is some of the… Read More
Cover crops deliver significant soil health and ground cover benefits, but they can often cause spring headaches when growers fail to kill them off in advance of corn and soybean planting. In this video report from Ontario Diagnostic Days 2021, Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs soil management specialists Anne Verhallen and Jake… Read More
How do you measure soil heath? On this episode of RealAgriculture’s Soil School, OMAFRA soil scientist and land use specialist Dan Saurette joins Bernard Tobin to look at some of the assessment tools available to farmers and the type of insights they provide. One of the most well known soil health tests is Cornell’s Comprehensive… Read More
A comprehensive survey of farmers in Ontario suggests that once farmers incorporate cover crops in to the cropping strategy, they tend to stay in the rotation. That’s according to the Ontario Cover Crop Feedback Survey, completed by graduate student Callum Morrison and advisor Yvonne Lawley with the University of Manitoba. They collaborated with the Ontario Cover… Read More
Phosphorus is a key nutrient for crop production, and requires careful management to ensure there’s enough P to feed a growing crop, but not so much that the nutrient moves off the field in run-off or soil movement. For what makes phosphorus management different versus say, nitrogen, we go to experts Dr. Merrin Macrae, professor… Read More
Whether or not you’re farming healthy soils depends on many things, says Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food, and Rural Affairs soil specialist Anne Verhallen. When asked what makes a healthy soil, Verhallen says that growers need to think first about the qualities of their soil, including properties such as soil texture — are you farming… Read More
Biology is a wonderful thing. Given enough time and the right ingredients, soil biological processes can do some pretty amazing things, including breakdown of herbicides, cycling and releasing nitrogen, and even disposing of pathogens. The key is time: biology and biological processes can replace plenty of crop inputs given enough time. Especially for our northern… Read More
The Lake Erie Agriculture Demonstrating Sustainability (LEADS) initiative is entering its final intake, beginning November 2, 2021. LEADS cost-share projects must be completed by September 30, 2022. The program, funded through the federal-provincial Canadian Agricultural Partnership, supports cost-share projects that improve soil health and reduce the risk of nutrient losses on farms while improving water quality in… Read More
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