Prairie farmers seeded fewer acres to winter crops this fall than they did in 2007.
Statistics Canada reported Dec. 5 that winter wheat area in the western provinces fell to 1.245 million acres, from 1.52 million last year. Fall rye area rose to 385,000 acres, up from 350,000 last year.
Analysts expected reduced winter wheat area because of a late harvest that had farmers still harvesting canola at the ideal time to seed winter crops.
Alberta bucked the trend with a slight increase of winter wheat to 320,000 acres from 300,000 last year. Fall rye was seeded on 100,000 acres, the same as last year.
Saskatchewan scaled back its winter wheat area by 25 percent to 450,000 acres. Rye rose to 200,000 acres from 170,000 last year.
Manitoba wheat acres dropped by 23 percent to 475,000 acres. Fall rye rose to 85,000 from 80,000 last year.
In Ontario, wheat seeding dropped to one million acres from 1.25 million last year. Rye slipped to 60,000 acres from 65,000 last year.
