Cereal growers will be wrestling with a forgotten foe as they head into their fields in coming weeks.
Extensive crop lodging has been reported across the northern portion of the prairie grain belt, which may result in yield losses and other harvest headaches this fall.
“It will seem somewhat new because we haven’t dealt with it for probably four years or so,” said Bruce Burnett, director of weather and crop surveillance with the Canadian Wheat Board.
He recently returned from a prolonged crop tour where he witnessed lodging in an estimated 10-25 percent of the lush wheat and barley fields he encountered in northern Saskatchewan and Alberta.
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“It’s not an unexpected amount given the type of crops that are out there,” said Burnett.
Heavy cereals have been toppled by wind and rain, leading to inevitable yield losses and quality problems in fields severely affected.
The problem is worse in northwestern Manitoba where crops were deluged with up to 152 millimetres of rain earlier this month, said Keith Watson, Manitoba Agriculture agronomist for the region. Damage is widespread throughout the area but the extent fluctuates from field to field.
“As an average, it’s probably 40-50 percent lodged.”
Watson characterized it as a one-in-20-year event for the region.
The good news is that nearly all the lodged crops were green when they went down because Manitoba is behind the other two prairie provinces in terms of crop development.
“I think a lot of them will come up. They’ll sort of be kneeling, but they’ll come up.”
An equipment dealer in Dauphin, Man., is reporting a run on lifter bars as producers gear up for what they expect will be a difficult harvest, said Watson.
Some good, some bad
Canola crops appear to have eluded the lodging problem while oats are faring better than wheat and barley, a fact that surprises Dennis Galbraith, manager of grain procurement with Can-Oat Milling.
“That’s a bit of an anomaly,” he said.
His best guess as to why that’s happening is the industry is finally making strides in oat agronomy.
“Perhaps the oats standing up as well as they have is a reflection of the reduced nitrogen fertilizer on them as compared to wheat and barley, but that is pure speculation on my part.”
Galbraith said the Manitoba cereals that lodged during the green stage of crop development will produce seed with lighter test weights.
Those in Saskatchewan and Alberta that went down during the ripening and dry-down stages will likely result in yield losses come harvest.
Whatever the case, it’s not nearly as big a problem as producers faced earlier this decade, said Burnett.
“I look on it from the glass half-full side, which is that at least there’s enough crop there to lodge.”
