ROBLIN, Man. — As he smothers his hamburger with ketchup, Wayne Zimmer muses about winning a lottery.
First he suggests he would sell his cattle herd and move out West. But later, after feasting on a burger and fries, he admits he would probably continue farming, even if he did win a million dollars.
“It’s just a way of life,” he says of the 30 years he has spent farming.
“I hate living in town. We lived in town when we first got married and that was enough. I like the country.”
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Zimmer and his wife both have jobs in town. He works at a shop that distributes cultivator shovels. His wife is head cashier at the local co-op store.
They own and lease cows. For Wayne, a day of work in town is followed by an evening of chores and checking on cows due to calve.
“I still haven’t learned,” he says.
The crow’s feet at the corners of his eyes deepen when he laughs. He seems a man who draws hope from optimism.
Besides raising cattle, he also grows alfalfa and timothy hay to sell. When asked what he sees as the outlook for his farm this year, he gives it one thumb up and one thumb down.
“It’s the best cattle have ever been and the poorest hay has ever been.”
Zimmer knows producers who are selling round hay bales for as little as $10 apiece. He’s managing to get $20 a bale, but admits it’s a struggle finding buyers.
With low grain prices in recent years, grain growers have shifted more of their land into forage production. That has added to the pressure on hay prices.
Across town, Mark Becker tends to a steady trickle of customers at Roblin Farm Services Ltd.
One of the customers wants seed. Another is looking for spare wooden pallets. A third customer ponders which dog food is the best buy.
“The protein is the same in both of them,” says Becker, nodding toward two stacks of bagged dog food.
“Nutrena has maybe a little bit bigger bag, but the price is about the same.”
The customer picks out a 50 pound bag and leaves.
Roblin Farm Services also sells livestock supplies, certified seed and fertilizer. Becker says it is hard to know which crops producers will put in the ground this year. Indecision lingers as spring seeding approaches.
“If there’s a lot of money in a crop, there’s an incentive to get out there and seed it,” says Becker. “But the incentive isn’t there this year.”
Wheat, canola and barley are a typical part of the crop mix in this area.
There were hints from producers here last week that they will be increasing their acres of red spring wheat. There’s a hope — maybe even an expectation — that prices for non-durum wheat will continue to improve into the new crop year.
At a grain farm south of Roblin, Harvey Simpson pulls a long cardboard box from the cab of his pickup and heads into a machine shed that doubles as a workshop.
The box doesn’t hold parts for his seeder or for the tractor that will pull it across his fields this spring.
Simpson, 62, is fixing up a 1950 John Deere Model D tractor. The cardboard box holds new gaskets and some other parts he will need for the restoration work.
He gets enthused when talking about the vintage tractor. It’s like the one his father once owned.
But Simpson doesn’t show much enthusiasm for the approach of spring planting. Like a lot of grain growers, he’s heading into the year unsure of whether he will make any money from his efforts.
“It’s anybody’s guess,” he says, silhouetted by daylight filtering through a window above his workbench.
“If the price goes up, maybe a guy can make a bit.”
However, he has gone through the motions of getting ready for another crop year. The anhydrous was applied last fall. He has bought his seed and dry fertilizer and his planting decisions are made. He will plant wheat on 480 acres and canola on another half section.
Simpson, a quiet-spoken man, has farmed at the same location since 1964. Both his children have left home to pursue other careers. He’s not sure how much longer he will stay farming.
“It depends on when my wife retires, or the machinery wears out or me.”
Annette Nicholas, regional forage specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, says the mood among grain growers in the Roblin district is much the same as everywhere else.
“They’re frustrated,” says Nicholas, who until recently was the area’s agricultural representative.
She senses the same indecision among farmers that Becker spoke about: high input costs, low prices for grains and oilseeds, and narrow margins. They make planting decisions that much tougher.
“It’s pretty hard to make a go of it,” says Nicholas, describing the scenario for grain and oilseed producers.
Limited options
With a typical growing season of only 95 frost-free days, there are limits on what farmers can plant in the Roblin area. Some pulse crops are grown here, but not a lot.
Soil moisture in the district was generally fair last fall. Abundant snowfall this winter means moisture levels should be good early in the crop year.
Farmers in the area were able to start planting in April last year, but that’s unlikely this year. Last week, bare patches were just starting to appear on hay fields and cropland.
Many growers in the area run mixed farms and have relied on livestock to help them weather poor grain prices.
Nicholas says there has been a gradual expansion of cattle herds in the area and she expects that to continue this year.
“It’s been the bright light in agriculture right now.”
There also is some hog production, but attempts to expand that industry have been slowed by critics concerned about odor and water quality.
