Wet or Dry

[seldomseen]

I always see a debate on here all the time about what is worse? Dry or wet and being from a wet area I was always on the wet is worse side. I know we struggle when it is wet, our work load seems to double and profits always shrink but most years we do get some bushels.
I just read a book about the history of the Palliser Triangle that covered the years from 1914 until 1938 and I have switched sides and will now say nothing is worse in farming than drought! It is hard to believe what those people went through during those years.
Settlement of the triangle started about 1908 and I am curious if anyone on here is or know of any farms that survived from that time period? I am thinking of municipalities like Shamrock, Mankota, Pinto Creek, Big Stick, Deer Forks, Hart Butte and Happy Land

[farming101]

Seldom, you may like this

[URL="https://ecommons.usask.ca/bitstream/handle/10388/etd-04262010-144125/McManus_Curtis__R_2004.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y"]https://ecommons.usask.ca/bitstream/handle/10388/etd-04262010-144125/McManus_Curtis__R_2004.pdf?sequence=1&isAllowed=y[/URL]

[Braveheart]

I'll take too wet. We farmed through the drought of the eighties and at times it seemed hopeless. My dad turned the cows out and herded them up and down road allowances. He'd sit out there all day with his horse, a stout buckskin quarter horse he called Lad, just herding. Pastures had no grass.

There was no hay. What little straw we got was so dry, we pumped water on to get the straw moist enough to ammoniate.

We could never grow enough barley for the hogs my wife and I were raising, forcing us to buy barley from wherever.

It just seemed hopeless. Grasshoppers, soil eroding, not enough moisture for germination. Wells went dry.

Too wet at least cows can graze, we can make silage. Grain production might be tougher, high disease pressure, etc., but for me too wet is better than too dry. Either way the weather is not in my circle of control so we just adapt and roll out whatever contingencies we might have.

[seabass]

I like to stay out of this debate but we are always a bit wetter than drier. I prefer it that way. Always seem to get something but I guess it depends on how your land drains. I've made the effort to get the water to run if possible so it lowers the drown out acres. My grandfather grew up through the thirties and started farming then and he prefered it drier as the machines were not as able to deal with muddy conditions. He hated the fifties. Said it was terrible wet. Always stuck. No aeration, no driers, no 4 wheel drive tractors poor roads. Times were tougher then for sure. I guess to answer your question it depends on which era u grew up in and the memories u have of those times on the farm.

[MBgrower]

Here in s. Mb we rarely have drought, but i certainly recall drought years such as 1988 . We are often on the too wet side, but we cope, we work on drainag every fall, and most farms have the hp, tires, tracks, etc to cope with mud, and the municipalities are generally good at cleaning out ditches within a year or so of notice. When we lose crop to excess moisture often it is only low spots or poorer land, but when there is a drought, all acres are affected. Id prefer to be on the wet side, at least there is a crop to harvest.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I think the wet vs dry argument really depends on who has livestock and who is straight grain with good insurance.

For all the complaining about wet(myself included) Those of us who have never seen really dry, should really consider how vital water is for farming.

We have a mixed farm, primarily grain lately. What is good for conditions for growing hay, and terrible for crops, what is good for growing pastures all summer, is bad for haying, what is good for harvesting hay and grain is terrible for pastures. and on and on. Almost always a silver lining. But with no moisture, none of it grows, no matter what SF3 might believe.

Coming from traditionally the wettest place on the prairies( OUtside of a few places in Manitoba), I have a different perspective when I travel east and see the flooded fields. I can't dream of farming flat black ground here, it just can't drain the amount of water we get. While I really admire the great soil and uninterrupted flat fields I see much further east, I know that if it were located here, it would be marginal pasture since it would flood out nearly every year. Not sure what the future holds, but if recent years are any indication, perhaps some of this formerly ideal flat land is better suited to other purposes? And perhaps dry is the long term normal and this is the exception, and it will once again be the best land around?

[ajl]

If you farmed through the 1980's with the benefit of of today's farming practices, you would have done quite well. Practices including chem fallow, pulse crop rotations, and balanced fertility along with less debt hangover from the late 70's would have made the decade a lot different. It was dry but not that dry in the 80's since big crops were produce some years like 86.

[fjlip]

Oh why not.... north of Quill lake where VERY wet since 2010, the next WAR is over water drainage! That you never have when dry. Neighbors mad as hell at each other, WSA police will be busy. Lawyers might be too. I have said before...enjoy the dry.

[seldomseen]

The only years I lost much yield from lack of rain '88 and '02. Some of the best years were the ones following drought years. The drier years makes farming fun we get our work done fast. Harvest is easy and the crop is dry and quality is good.
2010 was the wettest and I only seeded half my acres. The ground gets sour and won't grow much and all the water in the field starts to smell like sewage and you can hardly stand the humidity and the mosquitoes. It is a sick feeling when your crop is ready to harvest and you can see water glistening between the rows and you just try to dig some potatoes and they are white mush and stink like rotten eggs.
After reading Happyland by Curtis R McManus I realized how bad drought is when I never really experienced it myself.

[sumdumguy]

I didn't like the dirty eighties. Were it not for lentils, we were dead in the water. We sc****d them out of the dust and they were always worth quite a bit. The hoppers and moles were a huge problem. We sprayed from June until late July and I am sure we ingested enough Lorsban and Decis to kill - well something. Whenever I hear people swearing at the rain I cringe because I remember looking at those cloud banks coming from the west and then they would split and off they went further north. Our farming practices were terrible for the weather. Fall anhydrousing left the top 5 inches powdery dust. Not much germinated on a tenth of an inch of rain every two weeks. Not my cup of tea!

[furrowtickler]

There is an area Around Kindersly to Eston that was very dry last year and very wet this year . Would be interesting to hear the comparison.
But a dry year is not a drought.
2000-2003 was dryer than the 30's in some areas of western Sask.
you were better off to have nothing and get a bit of insurance than to have just less than 1/3 crop and get nothing from insurance - or very little.
Seen wheat sparse , spindly and just a bit taller than a beer can. A lot was less than 5 bus.
Zero till, half till , max till - in some areas it did not matter.
The guys who had nothing and crop insurance wrote it off were better off . They got full insurance and most never even had to take the combine out of the shed. It was not fun for those with crop yields just above the minimum write off.
Then 2004 hit and that finished a lot of guys on crop Insurance.
There is a pocket south Battleford now that has seen every rain in the past 5 years , actually a new lake has formed.
I am sure their view would be much different than others in this area on a dry / wet debate . Either way , extremes can test your grit as a farmer. And there still is no effective program for either IMO.
Some out west of here made out like Bandits in 2001 from GRIP. They had a very good 2000 then virtually had zero in '01. Cashed out big time with very little work. Anyone caught in between got fuked. So there the beginning of that drought was not so bad to handle for some and near disaster for others.

[WiltonRanch]

From what I remember the 80's grew good crops here but the 90's it steadily got drier culminating in 02'. 03' crop was 80% of average but drought broke that fall with a 6" downpour one night. Since then we've had a couple dry years to remind us but nothing like that dry period. Too much rain on flat land is awful but in hills not so much. I'll take wet over drought any day. When you have lots of sloughs and you're digging dugouts inside them to no avail majorly sucks.

[furrowtickler]

When you get 25% of average yields due to dry conditions - that's a drought . Not 80% , that's closer to a normal deviation

[megel57]

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