MELFORT, Sask. – Saskatchewan had 137,000 farms with an average farm size of 397 acres in 1935 when the Melfort Research Farm was established.
The Prairies were in the grip of the Dirty Thirties, and soil from many of those farms was mostly in the air or piled in drifts along sagging fence lines.
Four years earlier, however, the Carrot River Valley, in which the research farm is located, produced 2.9 million bushels of wheat, four times the amount produced in Prince Edward Island, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and British Columbia combined.
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Robert Weir, the federal agriculture minister who advocated for the research farm, said the area was also well suited to mixed farming.
It is located in northeastern Saskatchewan’s thick black soil zone of the aspen parklands and serves the farming community in the black and grey-wooded soil zones.
Wheat production is still abundant three-quarters of a century later, but the region also produces canola, barley, oats, field peas, flax and forage.
Seed production is prevalent, and livestock numbers have steadily increased over the past 15 years.
A cattle barn was one of the first structures to be built on the farm. Swine, sheep and poultry were also studied, but today there are no livestock on site.
The beef forage program, which operated from 1960-95, included research on the production, harvesting, storage, processing and feeding of forage crops for growing and finishing beef cattle and lambs.
The animals were successfully finished on rations containing up to 95 percent ground hay with three to five acidulated fatty acids, a byproduct of canola processing.
“We were looking for anything to do with lowering winter feed costs or anything to do with cattle production, so we had big projects with the Western College of Veterinary Medicine … and we did all sorts of vaccination work with VIDO, the Veterinary Infectious Disease Organization,” said Duane McCartney, who headed the cattle program from 1974 to1997.
A scours vaccination was developed with the Melfort calves used as the test herd.
The Pathlow Project, located at the Pathlow Community Pasture, was another joint venture, this time with the Saskatchewan Horned Cattle Trust Fund and Saskatchewan Agricultural Lands Branch.
“It was basically the first pasture to plate research program for beef and forage production in Canada” McCartney said.
The program also studied early and late calving. Many Saskatchewan cattle were being weaned and marketed to Ontario feedlots so farmers were looking for big calves in the fall.
McCartney said portable windbreak shelters made early calving viable, but the aging farm population pushed the shift to early May calving.
Pasture management work included examining combinations of grazing systems. Some of the first intensive rotational grazing in Western Canada was done in this project.
The program compared forage varieties, with meadow brome and alfalfa proving to be the best, and also developed fertilizer methods to produce more forage.
“With fertilizer, we could get two and a half times more production out of that piece of land than with no fertilizer, and would get a carryover effect into the next year,” he said.
“Eventually we were able to fertilize on alternate years.”
McCartney said the first research on swath grazing was done at Melfort. It proved to be a significant player in lowering winter feed costs.
“In those days, Melfort was … sort of the leader in the forage program,” he said.
“We had a weed scientist, we had a soil scientist, we had forage scientists, animal scientists, all working around the forage based beef program. Everything was basically geared toward economics … in the crops as well as the beef program.… The whole thing was, does the research make sense and will it be of economic benefit to producers? That was the bottom line.”
Research into crop production systems was made a priority in 1988, a new agronomy laboratory building was built and plant pathology was added to the program.
In 1992, the Melfort Research Station was integrated with Agriculture Canada’s research centre in Saskatoon and became the Melfort Research Farm.
In 1996 it was made responsible for researching sustainable cropping systems, and facilities formerly used for livestock research were retrofitted for field crop research or demolished.
“I find it ironic to be coming back to the 75th anniversary when these are the worst crops I’ve seen in my lifetime,” Tim Wright, a former crop scientist and station director, said during a recent 75th anniversary ceremony.
“It certainly demonstrates that the weather always trumps agricultural farming practices. We’re at the mercy of the weather and the climate.”
“And where is Ed Tanner?” he quipped as a crop duster flew over.
“The airplanes flying by are spraying midge. Most of the midge problem here is the fault of (Saskatchewan Agriculture employee) Ed Tanner. In 1983 he was looking in a farmer’s field and discovered this little bug flying around. Actually, we did the first published research in Canada on wheat midge.”
Although the farm received its official mandate to research sustainable crop production in 1996, Wright said work on yields and soil degradation was conducted earlier than that.
“We collaborated with the ministry of Saskatchewan Agriculture and we initiated pulse crop research here. We tried to be responsive to the needs of the area.”
Soil fertility research at Melfort contributed to provincial recommendations.
“Work done here by Wes Nuttall ( soil scientist) and others showed the importance of sulfur and boron for producing canola in grey soil zones,” Wright said.
“Pesticide studies were important for continuous cropping, and chem fallow studies were a precursor for farmers to practice conservation tillage. New crop varieties were continually being tested, and variety testing was on economic sustainability as well.”
CURRENT RESEARCH FOCUS
•crops for fuel and fibre
•soil, crop and nutrient management to improve soil quality
•sustainability of production practices to reduce greenhouse gas emissions
•intercropping legume and non legume annual crops
•experimentation with potential new crops such as prairie carnation
•fibre flax, camelina and quinoa
•testing biological control for sclerotinia stem rot in canola
THROUGH THE YEARS
1935
Melfort Experimental Farm established five kilometres south of Melfort, Sask. The land was purchased for $40 to $50 per acre. Weeds and soil erosion were identified as the major problems in the area.
1952
Livestock nutrition research initiated. Offspring of the purebred Yorkshire herd were used to evaluate rations for growing and finish hogs. A 20 pen broiler nutrition facility was built in the loft of the cattle barn, and research projects were carried out over three summers.
1966
The Melfort Experimental Farm became the Melfort Research Station.
1970
The horticultural research program ended. Melrose sainfoin was licensed. The alternative forage legume was developed by D.A. Cooke in co-operation with the staff at Lethbridge and Saskatoon. Melfort co-ordinated a Canada-wide study on the value of copper in swine rations.
1979
A study was initiated on the use of anhydrous ammonia to preserve high moisture hay. Remote sensing studies were conducted to develop a technique for assessing pasture productivity.
1980
Swine nutrition program ended.
1988
Crop production systems research was assigned priority.
1992
Melfort Research Station was integrated within the Saskatoon Research Centre and became the Melfort Research Farm.
1995
Livestock research ended to concentrate solely on crop and forage research.
2001
The agronomy building was retrofitted to better accommodate the sustainable cropping systems program. The sheep barn, retrofitted with grain dryers and seed cleaning facilities, became the seed processing building.
