A miniature watershed demonstrates how water sources are linked during the first Brandon water festival May 13.

Conservation district holds a water festival

Erosion, water patterns and pollution were among the themes explored at Brandon’s first water festival

Science beat out commerce in one corner of the Brandon Shoppers Mall May 13 as the Assiniboine Hills Conservation District hosted its first home water festival. Conservation district manager Neil Zalluski said the event focused on public awareness of conservation district operations, many of which are largely unknown to the general public. “The kids are

A new and more complete barley genome may set the stage for new and better varieties.

Barley genome fully mapped

German researchers, leading an international consortium, 
say they’ve given us the best picture yet of the barley genome

Scientists at Helmholtz Zentrum München, a German research centre, have published the closest look yet at the barley genome. They recently published their findings in the journal Nature and lead author Heidrum Gundlach says they hope the new and more detailed barley genome will help develop varieties resistant to pathogens and tolerant of climate fluctuations.


This flowering plant, Arabidopsis thalania or Thale cress, defends against invaders by recognizing and attacking foreign RNAs that it distinguishes by its lack of tail.

Plants can tell friend from foe

It’s no tall tale — this plant senses the lack of a tail on hostile RNA and attacks

University of Tokyo researchers are telling what might seem a tall tale — or should that be tail? They’ve published a study in the journal Nature Plants which says plants can tell if they’re being attacked by detecting whether or not the RNA in question has a threaded bead-like structure at the end. This ‘tail’

Researchers say a new technique to silence genes is a whole new way of looking at crop protection.

‘Gene-silencing’ technique is a crop protection game changer

This spray uses RNA to trick a plant into shutting genes off, thus evading diseases

Most crop protection products act by attacking and killing a pest. But a new technique targets the crops themselves, giving them an added ability to ward off pests and diseases by targeting their genes. Researchers at the U.K.’s University of Surrey and Australia’s University of Queensland, have developed a non-toxic, degradable spray which is capable

BrettYoung’s Eric Gregory and (l to r) DL Seeds’ Kevin McCallum and Sakaria Liban in the DL Seeds screening greenhouse.

Homegrown canola breeder sees opportunities and challenges

BrettYoung and DL Seeds say they’ll continue to be a major player in canola breeding in Western Canada

A Manitoba-based canola-breeding consortium says the current wave of lifescience mergers isn’t necessarily bad news for them. Winnipeg’s BrettYoung and Morden’s DL Seeds, a joint venture of two of the largest European oilseed rape-breeding companies, have been working together for a number of years to bring canola hybrids to market. They’ve seen their market share


The growth chamber system can reproduce past weather patterns, down to exact daily fluctuations.

Growth chamber system ‘test drives’ new varieties

Cameras can detect and quantify signals produced by plants

Following the lead of automakers who torture test their cars on special tracks that simulate real driving conditions, researchers at Michigan State University have developed a system to test drive new plant varieties before they reach the field. Called DEPI — Dynamic Environmental Photosynthetic Imaging — the system uses sensors, cameras and software to reproduce

Plants can grow in space, as demonstrated by this sunflower seedling on the International Space Station. What’s less clear is how to make agriculture successful in space over the long term.

Space agriculture key to exploration

Nobody knows exactly how space will affect plant growth and reproduction over the long term

Food is an essential of life and if humanity is to escape the cradle of Earth, producing food extraterrestrially is a looming challenge. A recent paper in the journal Botany Letters by French researchers from the University of Clermont-Ferrand, Auvergne demonstrates there are many challenges to address to ensure astronauts can grow enough food aboard

Genetically modified diamondback moth offers pest control hope

Genetically modified diamondback moth offers pest control hope

The modified moths can mate as well as any other but they only produce male offspring


Scientists in Britain say they have developed a way of genetically modifying and controlling an invasive species of moth that causes serious pest damage to cabbages, kale, canola and other similar crops worldwide. In what they said could be a pesticide-free and environmentally friendly way to control insect pests, the scientists, from the Oxford University


Spotted wing drosophila (SWD) is a vinegar (fruit) fly of East Asian origin that can damage many crops by piercing healthy fruit and laying its eggs.

Spotted Wing Drosophila an unwelcome visitor to fruit farms this summer

MAFRD began monitoring for SWD in 2013 and this is the worst year yet, say provincial fruit crops specialist

Altona-area fruit grower Waldo Thiessen knew what was wrong immediately when his U-pick customers started calling back a few hours after their first day in his raspberry patch in mid-July. “They said they’d started to make jam, and, well, there was a lot of protein (in the raspberries),” he said. It was larvae of spotted

Neal Gutterson (r), head of biotech for DuPont Pioneer says new tools are speeding up the crop improvement process.

Corn and soybeans headed north and west

DuPont Pioneer is among a number of companies that see huge 
growth potential on the western Prairies

Earlier-maturing varieties of corn and soybeans rolling out across the Canadian Prairies will provide new cash crop options and contribute to more sustainable rotations, a senior official with DuPont Pioneer said here last week. While it is widely acknowledged that farmers are squeezing their canola rotations too tightly, setting the stage for a rise in