High land prices got you down? Does $3,000 an acre just seem to darn high? Well there’s no doubt that land prices have climbed significantly in recent years, a little history lesson teaches us that when combined with very low interest rates and high commodity prices land is not priced outlandishly. Alberta Agriculture’s Merle Good… Read More
Category: FarmTech
It’s been nearly seven months since the Canadian Wheat Board became CWB — a pooling-focused wheat, barley and even canola marketing company operating in an open market. High cash prices since last fall had some expecting the pooling option wouldn’t be very popular, but as Ian White, CEO of CWB explains CWB isn’t just about… Read More
Farmers hit with aster yellows in 2012 aren’t likely to soon forget the devastation high infection rates can cause. The trickiest aspect of the disease is how futile it is to try and control it. The phytoplasma, carried on the aster leafhopper, is passed quickly from insect to plant and then the insect moves on…. Read More
Most farmers would find selling the farm and moving a province over a significant undertaking. What about moving an entire continent away? Would you do it? That’s what Stuart Barden did. After visiting Kenya during his Nuffield Scholar tour in 2009 and being wowed by the beautiful black soil and diverse landscape, Barden packed up… Read More
Tillage Radish, a large-rooted cover crop, is one we’ve talked about before on RealAgriculture.com. Kevin Elmy walked us through how he and his neighbours are making use of the crop in Saskatchewan. In this video, filmed at Farm Tech 2013, Patrick Fabian explains how farmers in his area of Alberta are making use of this… Read More
Six years ago, Albert Wagner needed 100,000 bushels-worth of added storage. The traditional bin route would have cost him about $2.45/bu over 10 years (including a residual value for the bins), but he also had one of two fertilizer bins nearing the end of its useful life. That got him thinking about bagging grain, which… Read More
Once again Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz took to the stage at the FarmTech conference to talk to a packed house about the state of agriculture in Canada. This year saw the Minister announce details on two federal Growing Forward 2 programs as well as address a number of other topics including the lay of… Read More
On Twitter yesterday Rick Taillieu, Alberta Canola, was having some fun at my expense (which at times is not really difficult). When you post a YouTube video, it grabs a screen shot to display at the front of the video before you press play. Some of the screen grabs are less than ideal in terms… Read More
Peter Johnson, wheat specialist with Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, made quite the splash at Farm Tech last week. A regular in RealAgricutlure.com’s Wheat School, @WheatPete (as he’s known on Twitter) has very set views on maximizing wheat production, and he’s not afraid to tell a farmer, point blank, what that farmer… Read More
Well, FarmTech wrapped up yesterday, and as all the farmers and industry folk get home and tackle the mound of work that’s been piling up the last three days, RealAgriculture.com has been hard at work putting together interviews from the conference, including this very special wrap up video. Rick Taillieu, Ron McLean’s number one fan and… Read More
It’s the last day of FarmTech — my very first one — and it’s been quite the week. The conference started with a big, bombastic Don Cherry look-a-like, featured popular presentations from Patrick Fabian, Stuart Barden, Drew Lerner and OMAFRA’s Peter Johnson, with the one and only Ron McLean speaking at Wednesday’s banquet, and will close… Read More
The economic impact of canola is visibly obvious across Alberta. It has become a mainstay on many farms across the west as canola acres push above 20 million acres. Offering support to that large amount of acres is no small task, and trying to stay ahead of the curve on any potential issue that can… Read More
August is coming and with it the end of an era on the prairies. August 1, 2012 officially marks the end of the Canadian Wheat Boards marketing monopoly in the West. The end of that monopoly means a lot of adjustments for producers and industry alike. How that individual marketing freedom will change the landscape… Read More
The Alberta Pulse Industry has room to grow. There are close to 1 million acres in Alberta dedicated to pulses with a mandate by the Alberta Pulse Growers Association to increase that by 15% over the next 2 years. There are a number of things that the Association is doing to help that along including… Read More
FarmTech 2012 was an incredible success by all measures. It managed to bring together some of the most progressive and diverse farmers from across the West to listen to some of the most innovative and knowledgable people in the industry. With such a diverse and savvy group available to us, we had to take the… Read More