Canola growers at the Nov. 16 Powering Your Profits event in Lethbridge got a chuckle out of the title of Autumn Barnes’ presentation: Make Canola Great Again. The reference to U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s campaign slogan was nevertheless appropriate as Barnes, of the Canola Council of Canada, encouraged growers to seek yield improvements. Her theme […] Read more
Barb Glen
Stories by Barb Glen
Alta. farmers wrap up sugar beet harvest
Southern Alberta’s sugar beet harvest is complete, comprising more than 820,000 tonnes of beets and an average yield of 28.67 tonnes per acre. Processing of all those beets continues at the Roger’s Sugar factory in Taber, Alta., and trucking beets from the outlying piling stations is under way, said Alberta Sugar Beet Growers executive director […] Read more
Alta. greenhouse growers brace for carbon tax impact
Alberta’s carbon levy, set to go into effect in January, will cost greenhouse growers an estimated $10,000 per acre next year, says the vice-chair of the Alberta Greenhouse Growers Association. The levy will raise natural gas prices by $1 per gigajoule in the first year and another 50 cents per gigajoule in 2018 under the […] Read more
More cattle positive for TB
Ranchers with cattle herds in quarantine travelled to Ottawa Nov. 21 to give a briefing scheduled the following day to the federal agriculture committee. Brad Osadszuk, owner of the cow initially confirmed with bovine tuberculosis, and others were invited by the committee to brief members on the situation in southeastern Alberta that now has 36 […] Read more
CFIA dismisses injured cow claims
A Canadian Food Inspection Agency investigation is complete into an August report of an injured dairy cow aboard a livestock transport truck in Ontario. The agency said it followed up with the parties involved and found that one animal had a surface injury that did not compromise its health and well-being during transport. No enforcement […] Read more
Tuberculosis spreads in Albertian cattle herd
Five more cattle infected with bovine tuberculosis have been found in southeastern Alberta, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency confirmed today. The five are from the same group as the first cow found with the disease, which was discovered in September after it had been shipped to the United States for slaughter. Dr. Penny Greenwood, national […] Read more
CFIA dismisses injured cow claims
A Canadian Food Inspection Agency investigation is complete into an August report of an injured dairy cow aboard a livestock transport truck in Ontario. The agency said it followed up with the parties involved and found that one animal had a surface injury that did not compromise its health and well-being during transport. No enforcement […] Read more
Mussels close in on Alberta irrigation districts
Quagga mussels, an invasive aquatic species, are moving ever closer to Alberta. Larvae of the mussels, called villagers, have been found in Montana’s Tiber reservoir east of Shelby, making the nearest point of spread only 80 kilometres away from Alberta’s waterways and vast irrigation systems. Tim Romanow, executive director of the Milk River Watershed Council, […] Read more
Farm puts out welcome mat
HIGH PRAIRIE, Alta. — Lyndon Drefs once tried to use his bale processor as a snow-making machine, but it didn’t work. The processor wouldn’t throw snow as far as he wanted while trying to augment the toboggan hill at EC Bar Ranch Adventures. Drefs and his wife, Denise, are gradually developing the agri-tourism aspect of […] Read more
Farmers’ dream takes flight
FAIRVIEW, Alta. — The crucial ingredient was farmer ingenuity. That’s what it took to move a broken, 20,000-pound former warplane with a 104-foot wingspan from remote Sitigi Lake near Inuvik, N.W.T., to a farm in Fairview, Alta. The plane is the Canso PBY-5A, and six farmers plus numerous other volunteers have been working to get […] Read more
