Water Woes Century Old

Shannon Stunden Bower is arguing for a damp look at Manitoba s agricultural history. The professor and author notes the image of the 1930s Prairie dust bowl still persists with many Canadians today, when in reality much of southern Manitoba is very wet, with poor natural drainage and frequent flooding. The first settlers embraced wet

Letters – for Mar. 3, 2011

In “Delaying the drainage” (editorial, Feb. 3) you referred to the Red River Basin report about storing water upstream, with an estimated 885,000 acres of one foot of storage being adequate to reduce peak levels. This probably wouldn’t take up 885,000 acres because some storage would be more than one foot deep, but nonetheless it


Tiles Reduce Risk Of Crop Loss –Wiebe

It’s not easy to calculate the direct payback of installing drainage tiles on farmland, but Stan Wiebe does know one thing. He sleeps better at night. “We have a lot less stress,” Wiebe, part owner of Beaver Creek Farms, told farmers attending a session on drainage at Ag Days. He believes drainage tiles have been

Drainage Enforcement Should Be Fair – for Aug. 19, 2010

A story about a western Manitoba farmer fined $474 for a ditch that was two inches too deep led KAP delegates into a discussion about drainage at a general council meeting here July 22. Their conclusion: drainage rules need to be enforced equitably across the province. “We have trees, cattails, willows, plugged culverts, ditches that


Province Softens Approach To Minor On-Farm Drainage

“It could have been an absolute nightmare.” – IAN WISHART, KAP In Oct. 2008, a Keystone Agricultural Producers council meeting was startled to hear farmers in southwestern Manitoba were getting letters from the province saying they would need licences to drain water from their land. The reason was Section 3(1) (c) of The Water Rights

Deep ditches don’t drain

After enduring a slaphappy September due to mosquitoes, at least one southern Manitoba farmer has had his fill of poorly designed farm drains. John Duvenaud blames drains and ditches that are dug too deep to properly function for creating a fertile breeding grounds for the pests. The risk of West Nile virus makes that hazardous