Farmers often fear a mid-summer heat wave, but the one that recently passed through Western Canada was just what the doctor ordered.
Crops have shot ahead, catching up much of the distance they had fallen behind normal development.
“It’s pushed crop development forward, which is good,” said Bruce Burnett, head of the Canadian Wheat Board’s weather surveillance unit.
“It’s exactly what we needed, because we were way behind.”
The heat wave in the U.S. Midwest is also helping prairie farmers because it is hurting yield potential.
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“This is all about corn,” said Burnett.
He said corn has been in its crucial, yield-setting reproductive phase, which is when it is most vulnerable to damage.
“This is not a great time for corn to be enduring temperatures above 90 F and having hot evenings. It’s taken any of the high-end yields that anybody was expecting and making them impossible to make.”
World markets are closely watching the U.S. corn crop. Stocks are tight and U.S. farmers need to produce a big crop to have enough supplies for present demand.
However, it might have been hurt by the heat wave that scorched the southern plains and southern corn belt, although it is hard to tell how much damage has been done.
DTN analyst Darin Newsom said farmers in the U.S. Midwest are divided over the extent of the corn damage.
“This topic has divided the corn belt, sometimes pitting family member against family member.”
Disappointing corn yields would probably help the price of prairie crops, which have been following corn.
The prairie heat wave helped many crops in saturated areas catch up to near where they should be at this time of the year, but they still aren’t likely to be excellent crops.
“The combination of being sopping wet in the spring and then dry for most of July is not a prescription for bin-busting yields,” said Burnett.
The heat likely boosted protein in wheat, he added.
The impact on canola will take weeks to see. Heat is dangerous to flowering canola, but the main damage is done if night temperatures are too high to allow crops to recover.
That generally wasn’t the case for more than a few days during the recent heat.
