David Sefton doesn’t hesitate when asked to describe his farmland near Broadview, Sask.
“It looks like lakefront property,” he said.
Fortunately for him, 1,200 of his 4,500 acres are in the Qu’Appelle Valley where the land’s natural slope has thwarted the development of swamps and sloughs.
“The land out of the valley, we probably won’t get any of it seeded this year,” he said.
Sefton was able to plant only 120 of the 530 acres he intended to seed to flax this spring.
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Saskatchewan Agriculture reports that seeding is the furthest behind in the province’s southeastern corner, where Sefton farms.
An average of 44 percent of the crop was in the ground in districts 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B and 3ASE as of June 13. Most years, seeding is almost complete.
The districts usually account for half of the province’s flax crop.
Manitoba’s flax area is also experiencing seeding difficulties.
Sefton figures he is better off than other farmers in the southeast, judging by the precipitation maps he has consulted. As a result, he believes flax planting will be well below normal in the Prairies’ most critical growing region.
“I’m really guessing here, but I’m suggesting anywhere from 15 to 25 percent (of seeding intentions) will probably be the maximum,” he said.
That would be a big blow to production, considering Saskatchewan normally accounts for 80 percent of the flax crop.
Sefton estimates western Canadian flax growers will seed only half of the 1.2 million acres they told Statistics Canada they intended to grow this year.
That number is not too far off what a leading flax industry analyst is projecting.
“We’re going to be hard pressed to get 700,000 acres,” said Larry Weber, owner of Weber Commodities Ltd.
He was shocked that Agriculture Canada barely reduced its estimate of harvested flax acres in its latest supply and disposition report, yet trimmed canola plantings by 800,000 acres.
“We should be seeing $20 flax now if everybody woke up,” said Weber.
Bids have risen to $15 per bushel where Sefton farms, which is up about $1 per bu. from a month ago.
“We have a target in for $16. We’ll see where we get to,” he said. “You can only take flax numbers so high before the markets start to back away.”
Weber said buyers can be turned off the crop if prices stay high in Western Canada, which appears inevitable given the estimates of lost acres.
Flax’s reputation has already been tarnished by the Triffid incident, in which a genetically modified variety was found in shipments to Europe.
Flax is already trading for $740 per tonne in Europe compared to $463 per tonne last year.
“It could screw up our flax market,” said Weber.
“The push is going to be on to get more flax acres in Russia and they’ll end up supplying our markets.”
North Dakota’s flax crop appears to be in as much trouble as Saskatchewan’s. Growers intended to seed 380,000 acres, or 90 percent of total U.S. plantings. Wet weather is crimping those plans.
Growers had planted only 57 percent of their intended acres as of June 12.
