four documentary filmmakers

Ag documentary on Red River Selkirk settlers released

2012 celebrations of the bicentenary of the Red River Selkirk settlers inspired the documentary’s creation

A four-part documentary made for Prairie Public Television that spans the beginning of farming in Manitoba to present day and looks to what the future holds premiered in Winnipeg last week. “Built on Agriculture” is the culmination of more than three years’ work to produce a compelling and engaging television series telling a story of

AAFC’s Stephen Morgan Jones says private investment is necessary to fill the wheat variety research gap in Canada.  photo: allan dawson

AAFC official says private companies needed to fill wheat research gap

There’s a multimillion-dollar wheat research funding gap in Canada that the private sector needs to fill, says Stephen Morgan Jones, director general of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada’s (AAFC) Prairie/Boreal Ecozone. It will require stronger plant breeders’ rights rules and partnerships with publicly funded researchers, he told the Grain Industry Symposium Nov. 20 organized by the


The value of trees

On bitterly cold and blustery winter days on the farm, there wasn’t much by way of trees to block our view of those fiery red sunsets framed by sundogs over the drifting snow. It’s a view I am glad I experienced. But as beautiful as it was, it’s not a view I miss. We grew

Prairie dog families know how to get along

If the relatives have left, then it’s time for you to leave too — if you are a prairie dog, that is. A study published in Science by behavioural ecologist John Hoogland of the University of Maryland says for most animals, individuals leave a territory to avoid competition with nearby relatives, such as mother or

Rethinking the possibilities of trees

Rethinking the possibilities of trees

The view from Northern Blossom Farms

In this third letter from Northern Blossom Farms, Gary Martens 
discusses ways to keep trees on the landscape.

In my first letter I advocated integrating livestock and crops for the synergistic benefits of both components to the farming system. In the next letter, I discussed my crop rotation which includes perennials but is still based mainly on annual crops. In this letter, I want to propose the integration of trees as a beneficial


Alliance seeks improved wheat photosynthesis, nutrient use

Alliance seeks improved wheat photosynthesis, nutrient use The Canadian Wheat Alliance wants to boost wheat yields by developing new varieties with increased tolerance to drought, heat, cold and diseases such as fusarium head blight and rust. “By working in an integrated fashion and bringing in additional collaborators and contributors, the alliance is striving to ensure

Agriculture Canada’s Cereal Research Centre in Winnipeg is being mothballed and its research staff transferred to other locations.  photo: shannon vanraes

Where is AAFC’s wheat-breeding program headed?

After closing Winnipeg’s Cereal Research Centre, the federal government has
invested $85 million in a new wheat research program in Saskatoon

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) has led Canadian wheat breeding for more than 100 years, but recent actions by the federal government have some wondering about its future role. A year ago, Ottawa announced it will close AAFC’s venerable Cereal Research Centre on the University of Manitoba’s Winnipeg campus because it would cost too much

Leigh Syms, retired associate curator of archeology at the Manitoba Museum, holds a replica of a bone hoe once used by First Nations farmers.   Photo: Shannon VanRaes

Manitoba’s agriculture history started long before the sodbusters arrived

Researchers say plants such as lamb’s quarters aren’t here by accident, and growing corn goes back more than a millennium

Does it ever seem that unrelenting weeds such as lamb’s quarters and amaranth were somehow bred to thrive on the Canadian Prairie? In fact, they were. But if you think corn is a new crop in this part of the world, think again — Aboriginal farmers were growing it more than a millennium ago. Technology


Fighting more deserts

When I went to the barber in Swift Current in the summer of 1937 to get a haircut and shave, he said the haircut was OK but he had quit shaving people. I asked “how come” and he said he couldn’t keep an edge on the razor anymore. With the terrible dust and the shortage

AgCanada boss says budget cuts won’t affect fusarium head blight research

Recently retired plant pathologists Andy Tekauz and Jeannie Gilbert will be replaced, 
but the positions will be in Morden, not Winnipeg

Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada isn’t easing up in the battle against fusarium head blight, says the director general for the department’s Prairie/Boreal Plain Ecozone. “Fusarium work is a high priority,” said Stephen Morgan Jones. “It is, along with the rust diseases, a very high priority for us.” Jones said two recently retired fusarium experts from