Friday Crop Report on a Thursday!

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I'm under no illusions that where we were was one of the very best areas on the prairies to grow grass - but there are advantages and disadvantages in every area. One thing I notice is how much earlier the grass grows here - you wouldn't believe how much grazing we have under our belts by May 25th, a time when things were just starting to kick into high gear at our former location.

Very true, we are the last place anywhere to green up. In fact around our yard is slower even than a few miles away in most directions. Trees, grass, soil temp, snow melt all later, it is a disadvantage for sure. I seem to recall a few months ago, me insisting that a short growing season and lack of heat units was our biggest restriction, and you insisting that drought is. Yet you knowingly moved two provinces away to a zone with less rain and a longer growing season/more heat units. I would argue that it was a very wise career move, especially with the ever present threat of cooling ( global, local or otherwise), but runs counter to your stated concerns.

[malleefarmer]

Have a friend who has 4 rain gauges on 6000 ajoining acres and said i should do the same you will be atonished at differences at times. Basically 14 inch rainfall and can vary by over 1.5 inches in a year.

Im yet do it, yeah thunderstorms for sure but general rains i doubted him but he said not so even then huge differences.

I bought a farm in 1996kms from "main" farm just on top of a range of hills and history according to my father who was mates with owner twice removed and used to travel to meeting together etc.

Dad said you have to buy it get a inch more rain up there well aint happened consistently yet but time will tell.

[malleefarmer]

Oh and my crop report much below average but but with forecast a "huge" rains over next 2 to 3 weeks which may turn things around.

I really dont know how im gonna piss and shit and wipe my ass with me fingers crossed for 3 weeks guess i will find a way

[grassfarmer]

Very true, we are the last place anywhere to green up. In fact around our yard is slower even than a few miles away in most directions. Trees, grass, soil temp, snow melt all later, it is a disadvantage for sure. I seem to recall a few months ago, me insisting that a short growing season and lack of heat units was our biggest restriction, and you insisting that drought is. Yet you knowingly moved two provinces away to a zone with less rain and a longer growing season/more heat units. I would argue that it was a very wise career move, especially with the ever present threat of cooling ( global, local or otherwise), but runs counter to your stated concerns.

We are talking about 2 different purposes though as you revealed recently that you are primarily a grain farmer despite living in a grass area. For you short season and lack of heat units may be your biggest problem - for me growing grass it never was - if we got the moisture we could grow enough in June to keep the herd grazing well into winter.
Moving here was purely to escape the oil patch and it's industrial pollution problems. We can argue about how much rain we need for our differing types of agricultural enterprises but if you don't have safe drinking water you don't have anything.

[furrowtickler]

On variance on rain fall ... we have a huge rain fall difference and most of our land is within 5 miles of main farm ..... not just once , at least 50% of the time .
We get more rain along HWY 4 , north of us 3 miles and east of us is a strip that gets 25% more rain than the main farm 80% of the time .
It is very , very rare we get a general rain that covers everything, once a year .. maybe

[SASKFARMER3]

Furrow I agree 100% with you.

We have one farm north of town that every one laughs no sign of rain and pavement wet some days, freak shower over night.

It always rains at Garth’s place.

This myth that a area is all the same is bullshit.

Valley changes storms.

Forest area attracts rain.

Hot dry week coming up will take yield down a bit as crop won’t fill as nice as it could do. Others who are short will see early maturing.

Like farm link said it’s a huge crop bigger than last year coming. Ha ha ha

[bucket]

Little showers now will do nothing but act as a desiccant. ....watch how fast it turns....

No different than cutting hay....the swath stays green until moisture hits it... then poof it's brown. ..