CONQUEST, Sask. – Residents of Conquest, which has dubbed itself the caragana capital of Canada, are concerned about the large numbers of shelter belts being removed in the area.
Cor Van Raay, an Alberta feedlot owner who bought 122 quarters near Conquest, hired a crew to clear the land.
“I thought I did the country a lot of good by getting rid of all these trees … farming a quarter section rather than little pieces of 40 acres,” Van Raay said, adding the shelter belt clearing was necessary to accommodate large farming equipment.
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“It costs a lot of money to take them out, but improves the efficiency of farming significantly.”
However, since area residents started complaining, Van Raay has agreed to a compromise.
“I told them I would plant up to three miles back at whatever spot they choose at my cost…. Not on my land, but somebody else who’s convinced they should have some trees back,” he said.
Al Barrington, Reeve of the Rural Municipality of Fertile Valley, said nobody likes change and the trees represent the past.
“These trees were planted in the ’30s and the people’s forefathers planted them and looked after them,” he said.
Terry Joyes, whose land borders Van Raay’s, is frustrated with seeing the shelter belts removed and being unable to do anything about it.
In aWestern Producerletter to the editor published Sept. 16, Joyes describes the large-scale removal of the shelter belt as a travesty.
“Approximately 100 miles of shelter belt has already been bulldozed out, with more to follow,” he wrote.
Barry Barton and his brother, Huey, custom farm the land for Van Raay.
“He (Van Raay) gains probably 30 feet on a mile of tree row,” Barton said.
“I hate to see all the tree rows go because I like hunting, but there comes a time when some of the tree rows have to go.
“There’s too many fields out there right now that are too small …. When you start adding up the overlap and the time, it takes away your productivity as far as getting things done.”
Ray Cole of Conquest said the benefits of tree rows outweigh the loss in productivity.
“Tearing the trees down, he’ll (Van Raay) definitely lose yield on his crops.”
With shelter belts, “There’s no water evaporation off the soil because the wind doesn’t get down and dry the soil out.”
One of the early champions of farm shelter belts was Peter Hugh Kennedy of Conquest, dubbed the “father of field shelter belts.”
In 1922, he planted shelter belts on three sides of his home.
Widespread wind erosion in the 1930s prompted him to petition for a federal government shelter belt planting program.
Kennedy then helped organize the Conquest Field Shelter Belt Association, which planted about 1,300 kilometres of shelter belts during the next 25 years.
Saskatchewan Agriculture later promoted a province-wide program of planting, creating about 15,000 kilometres of field and roadside shelter belts.
