Strong winds in west-central and northwestern Saskatchewan have blown a good spring for some farmers in those regions.
An official with Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation said that while that overall reseeding claims are down, there are more wind-related claims than there have been in a while.
“We haven’t had a lot of wind damage quite frankly in the ’90s,” said Ken Svenson, manager of customer service.
He said the agency has received 1,186 reseeding claims to date and he estimates up to one-half of those are wind-related. In years where frost is a big problem, the corporation can get up to 5,000 claims in the spring. Not all of those result in payments.
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Officials with Manitoba Crop Insurance Corporation and Alberta’s Agriculture Financial Services Corporation said wind hasn’t been a big factor in their reseeding claims.
The bulk of the wind-related Saskatchewan claims were filed at crop insurance offices in North Battleford, Humboldt, Saskatoon, Kindersley and Rosetown, which are all dry.
Larry Gramiak, a Saskatoon-based agrologist with Saskatchewan Agriculture, said the strong winds the province has experienced over the past couple of weeks wouldn’t have been a problem had it been accompanied by rainfall.
“If (farmers) had some rain prior to the wind, there wouldn’t be any soil particles blowing around and sandblasting these plants and cutting them off.”
Even a shower after the winds would have helped some crops regenerate. But Gramiak said the situation would have been worse in the days before low disturbance seeding.
“If we’d have seen these kind of winds 10 years ago, we’d have had some horrendous black clouds in this part of Saskatchewan.”
Gramiak said canola growers were hit the hardest because the crop’s growing point is located above the ground.
Pulse crops that do a lot of growing underneath the soil have a better chance of reviving.
Saskatchewan crop insurance pays $20 per acre for cereals and mustard, $25 per acre for canola and $30 per acre for pulse crops that have to be reseeded.
The benefit is designed to compensate growers for the cost of buying and planting new seed.
