Friday Crop Report on a Thursday!

[GDR]

Some good news.
Corn in the area is phenomenal. No drown out holes, very even, it loves this heat, and wow it must be water efficient. Will probably make real cobs at this rate. Of course most of us gave up and quit after the continuous drownings and cold short seasons of recent years.
quarter inch of rain 2 days ago, biggest (only notable) rain we've had since the very beginning of July.

Combines going already in this area on barley. Very short, but looks like decent yields, no reports yet.

Pastures and hay are very depressing not far east or south of here. Still holding on well in this immediate area. Neighbor doing second cut that looks excellent. All my pasture is lowland, so it is still growing back.

I noticed how fast trees are growing this year. Must be tapped into good moisture, and with all this heat, they just exploded. Too bad they didn't leave anything for the crops next to them.

My wheat is turning fast. Slightly later seeded is holding on much longer than early. As usual, early seeding didn't pay on this farm. Always a different reason. Economically, we seem to be better off fighting winter to get the big crop off, than have an easy early harvest with much less yield. Not sure what this will yield. Looks disappointing, but this variety always surprises me to the upside.

I only have 2 quarters of barley, one is on gravel, still green except the gravel spots where it has turned white, and the white areas grow daily. The other quarter on good ground is half lodged after the 1/4" of very light showers with no wind, so there must be something there.

Canola found moisture, somehow, not sure how. Looks very good, even the patchy stands within the sod seeded look solid. Still not quite done flowering in most places.
Strangely enough, on the stuff the quit flowering sooner than expected, the plants along the edges where the deer have been eating it off constantly keep flowering, and they are a foot taller than the rest. So it must have been the heat that shut the rest down, not lack of water or nutrients. Or did these late plants keep growing roots deeper while battling with the deer, where the earlier plants couldn't grow roots fast enough to keep up to dropping soil water levels?

I was through Caroline and Rocky the other day, hay looks good, grass still green, some crops not bad but could use a drink, was wondering as going through if you are that far west or not?

Still no measurable rain since the first week of July. Grass is gone here and brown, I'm seriously wondering if it might die, our grass and trees just aren't used to this and may be damage for years to come.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I was through Caroline and Rocky the other day, hay looks good, grass still green, some crops not bad but could use a drink, was wondering as going through if you are that far west or not?

Still no measurable rain since the first week of July. Grass is gone here and brown, I'm seriously wondering if it might die, our grass and trees just aren't used to this and may be damage for years to come.

If you drew a line between Caroline and Rocky, our farm would be about 4 miles East of that, and closer to Caroline than Rocky. Very little crop farming west of here. If you took 22, on the west side of the Clearwater river
, That is much different soil, topography and even climate.
I've been back and forth to Olds this summer and thought things looked good to the north and west. Then I detoured south, and east. The difference was stark. Brown pasture,brown hayfields, sparse grey canola except in the bottoms. And that is just within a few miles.
You definitely weren't exaggerating. Worse to be that Close to the good crops. My sympathies to you folks

[WiltonRanch]

Got done cutting greenfeed. Worst was straight oats on ground I fed cows on last winter. Lots of om and cow poop but oats packed it in. Best stand was in grass 4 years ago and fallowed. It was barley and oats and way better. Aside from some spots barley appears better than the wheat. Think it’s the short maturity wheat I grow cause neighbours longer maturing varieties are way better. Will have enough feed for the cows. Sure can tell fields which had lots of straw baled off vs little. Wow what a stark difference. We don’t take hardly any for last 6 years as we could see it was not beneficial for the land. These straight cow guys will have to realize this. I am a cow guy too and this issue keeps me up at night about sustainability in dry years knowing straw removal sets you back on crops and forage when dry. As I said before wheat just sucks. Think canola will outyield it this year and that’s not saying much.

[SWFarmer]

Good morning all.

Started harvest here at our place. In two words : NOT GOOD. Peas last week , average bu/ac was 6 ! Would have been better if there was a 2 in front of that 6 . Started durum yesterday , first hopper full was 6.5 bu/ac . sloughs were a 30bu crop , but only had 2 of those , so you can guess what the rest of it looked like. Sure hoping that my average yield is going to be better as we go , but I won't say much till we hammer it all through. Quality on my durum is good, and I am glad we have some carryover we didn't sell last crop year. It's nice getting texts from the local elevator showing a #1 durum with 12 pro at $15.67 per bushel. I am holding out for 20, or more. You never know , it might get there.

If anyone out there is going to complain about a 20 bu/ac crop or a 30 when it should have went 60 , be happy with what you got, because some of us got 1/3 of that or less.

Talked to a fellow I know over by Walsh Alberta two days ago. He had heard that one of the colonies in the area had a wheat crop that was 2-5 bpa. Just let that sink in for a bit , and I saw that crop , the stand looked good, but it was "Trudeau wheat" ..... nothing in the f@#$%ing heads !

Take care all.

Ceres grain has $18 durum now...

[helmsdale]

Peas have run anywhere from 2 to 12.5. Should average about 8-9.

Mustard ready to go except for the kochia... what to do?

Durum finishing fast.

General "from the road" view is that fields are getting greener. Kochia is taking over.

I'm smashing guards, destroying knives, wearing out skid plates, and thrashing new combine elements. Starting to look forward to winter already...

[fjlip]

An election stops all Federal help.

Part of the plan.

Oh sask canola and it’s stupid 16.6 mt crop as for your Checkoff back there not even in the game. This is what your money is paying for complete bullshit.

This month is when you NEED to apply for a refund from canola/wheat levies...just reminding

[BreadWinner]

You know there are so much red tape in getting back your checkoff you would think it was their money. On one you have to answer a survey before it will let you access the forms. You are not allowed to vote even though you don’t always get all your money back. If one part of your name or address does not match the elevator receipt your shit out of luck. If they don’t receive your rebate form or it magically gets lost it’s your tough luck. They all have different rules and dates when the checkoff rebate form is due. If you have to call them they are extremely rude it’s like your stealing from them. I jumped through all the hoops and hope to get over $10,000 back this year.
Poor pea producers get it in the rear and don’t even get a thanks. Maybe they will find a new market for your 5bus/ac crop.

[furrowtickler]

Got done cutting greenfeed. Worst was straight oats on ground I fed cows on last winter. Lots of om and cow poop but oats packed it in. Best stand was in grass 4 years ago and fallowed. It was barley and oats and way better. Aside from some spots barley appears better than the wheat. Think it’s the short maturity wheat I grow cause neighbours longer maturing varieties are way better. Will have enough feed for the cows. Sure can tell fields which had lots of straw baled off vs little. Wow what a stark difference. We don’t take hardly any for last 6 years as we could see it was not beneficial for the land. These straight cow guys will have to realize this. I am a cow guy too and this issue keeps me up at night about sustainability in dry years knowing straw removal sets you back on crops and forage when dry. As I said before wheat just sucks. Think canola will outyield it this year and that’s not saying much.

Cutting fabas to bale up . SFA there

[furrowtickler]

Making silage bales

[SASKFARMER]

Two barley done now started the second two hope to harvest Sunday and Monday.