Rumour Mill Wrong About Packers Dragging Their Feet

There is no validity to rumours that meat packers may be reluctant to embrace the Canadian Cattlemen’s Association’s (CCA) Beef InfoXchange System (BIXS), says spokesman Larry Thomas. “On the packer question I can share that yes, we have not been public in sounding the horns about packer support for BIXS, but rest assured we are

Sunflower Acres Look To Rebound In 2012

Manitoba sunflower crops are looking good, the problem is there just aren’t that many this year. More than half of the province’s sunflowers are grown in southwestern Manitoba National Sunflower Association of Canada (NSAC) president Kelly Dobson said Aug. 19, during a tour of the Manitoba Crop Evaluation Trials’ (MCVET) sunflower plots. A wet spring


Dry Iraq Tries New Drought Resistant Grains

Iraq this year plans to start sowing a new generation of grain seeds it hopes will be more resistant to drought and soil salinity and could help bolster its wheat crop in a couple of years, an agriculture official said. The Iraqi government’s meteorological department last week said it expected three years of drought, and

Crop Report – for Sep. 1, 2011

SOUTHWEST REGION Little to no precipitation fell over the past week. Weather was favourable for harvest operations. Winter wheat and fall rye harvest is 90 per cent complete with yields below average. Most areas are reporting winter wheat yields in the 40 to 50 bushels/acre range with good quality and average protein. Several producers started


Daylily Division

September is a good time to dig up, move and divide perennials. Naturally we want to wait until late September or early October to do this for perennials which are still producing some bloom; there is no point in cutting short the bloom period as it is short enough as it is in my area.

CWB Sees More Wheat And Durum This Year

The Canadian Wheat Board raised its 2011-12 outlook for wheat and barley on Friday, as a warm, dry summer looks to produce bigger harvests than a year ago. Spring floods left an estimated six million acres unplanted across the Prairies, but a hot summer with timely rains has helped crops in Alberta and most of


Grain Growers Offers Budget Wish List

Modest changes in government policy could reap major benefits for farmers, the Grain Growers of Canada says in a pre-budget consultation paper for the Commons Finance Committee. Making agriculture research a key priority and rewarding producers for good environmental farm practices are among the suggestions GGC has for the committee, which holds hearings this fall

Dow Introduces Triple-Resistant Soybean

Dow AgroSciences is launching a genetically altered soybean seed aimed as a direct assault on the dominance of global seed leader Monsanto. Dow submitted a regulatory package on Aug. 19 seeking government approval for a glyphosate-tolerant soybean that the company says would be the “first-ever, three-gene,” herbicide-tolerant soybean. The new soybean will be tolerant of


Syngenta Sues Bunge Over Rejection Of GMO Corn Type

Syngenta Seeds, a unit of the world’s largest agrochemicals company Syngenta AG, has filed suit against major grain handler Bunge for refusing to accept a type of its biotech corn. Syngenta claims Bunge’s North America operations are illegally refusing to handle a type of genetically modified corn that is designed to protect the crop against

Late Blight Found In Tomatoes

The first case of late blight, the bane of Manitoba tomato growers last year, was confirmed last week on garden tomatoes in Ashern. Five cases of the fungal disease responsible for the Irish Potato Famine in the 1840s, have been detected in potatoes, including in a “sentinel” plot at the Canada-Manitoba Crop Diversification Centre near