Seeding delays and other difficulties this spring in Manitoba and Saskatchewan drove down the number of acres planted to corn, sunflowers and some pulse crops.
In Manitoba, soybean acres will be only about half of what was anticipated, said Manitoba Agriculture agronomist John Hollinger.
Only about 100,000 acres of corn got planted in Manitoba, instead of the 140,000 anticipated earlier in the year. The province’s edible bean acres will be roughly 80 percent of what was expected.
Sunflower acres will also be reduced, said Hollinger, noting that the crop needs about 120 days to grow to maturity. With the wet, cool spring, some farmers were unable to plant the crop early enough to provide a reasonable growing season.
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In Saskatchewan, lentils and flax appear to be two of the crops most likely to see fewer acres because of cool, wet weather.
“I think that it just got a little late for lentils,” said Dale Risula, Saskatchewan Agriculture’s specialist in integrated cropping management.
“The rainfall and everything kind of delayed things and they couldn’t get out and seed them, and now it is too late.”
Risula said some flax crops had poor emergence, prompting the need to reseed.
Farmers forced to change their planting intentions tended to favour crops like barley and oats, he said.
“They’re a little easier to get started and established and they’re less impacted by the later seeding date. Some of the other crops like lentil and field pea seem to suffer more adverse yield loss by being seeded later.”
