The snow will soon cover the crops display at the entrance to Yorkton, Sask., but that won’t stop Thom Weir from making plans for next year’s enhancements.
This was the third year of operation for the Crops of the Parkland display organized by Weir, an agronomist with Viterra, with support from the Chamber of Commerce, Tourism Yorkton and numerous sponsors.
The half-acre area, divided into four-metre by one-metre plots, is planted to various prairie crops. Every plot has a sign describing it and its uses, and each has a sponsor. Visitors can take self-guided walking tours of the plots.
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Weir says visitors numbered in the thousands this year and more signage via sponsors is giving a higher profile to the project.
Planting, spraying and harvesting small plots, each according to crop needs, is a tremendous amount of work.
The display includes six wheat varieties, two-row and six-row malt, hulless and silage barleys, several types of oats, napus, rapa and juncea canola, three types of mustard, sunflowers, safflowers, rye, triticale, forages and 15 or 16 special crops including three different beans, two types of lentils and two of chickpeas.
Weir also planted several heritage crops this year, to show the evolution of prairie crops, but the emphasis is on modern agriculture.
“Lots of places discuss how it used to be,” Weir recently told a group of farm writers. “We want to talk about how modern agriculture is feeding the world.”
Part of the focus is agronomics. For example, this year Weir provided flea beetle treatment to one canola plot and none to another, to illustrate to visitors the reasons farmers use crop chemicals.
Agricultural groups have noticed the display and asked to be involved, Weir said. One such request led him into the red-tape quagmire of hemp, which required him to provide GPS co-ordinates, undergo a police check and wait for government approval.
Having planted the crop, Weir referenced Ecclesiastes in his correspondence with bureaucrats, noting that while they delayed, the time to plant was progressing rapidly toward the time to reap.
Eventually the application was denied so Weir disposed of the crop. Don’t look for hemp when touring the display next year.
The Crops of the Parkland Walking Tour may be as interesting to farmers as it is to visitors. It offers quick comparisons between crops, and the agronomic focus is instructive. As for those less informed about crops, Weir says the display has settled more than one spousal argument about crop identity.
It’s an excellent display, and one worth continued support.
