Producers who were drowned out in northeastern Saskatchewan last year are entering 2011 with a renewed sense of optimism, says Wes Black, who farms near Somme.
Black and his neighbours received 1,000 millimetres of rain last year, and most farmers in the area seeded only one-third to one-half of their normal acreage.
But to their delight, last year’s moisture either soaked into the soil or disappeared as runoff.
And the amount of snow, which Black called average to slightly above average, disappeared slowly and evenly this spring, leaving farmers surprised at how well fields have come through the winter.
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“It’s quite amazing how things have dried up,” said Black, who seeds 3,300 acres in an ideal year.
“We expected to have water laying everywhere this spring because it was so wet last year.
“There was water everywhere last fall and all the creeks were running.… There was a lot of water in the system but we ran a lot of water off the fields this year.”
Black said farmers in northeastern Saskatchewan need a warm, sunny spring with no significant rainfall.
So far, Mother Nature has obliged.
Last week, Black said farmers would be in the fields before mid-May, barring significant rainfall.
Northeastern Saskatchewan has received little or no rain since April 1.
Nipawin received 11 mm and Melfort just eight. That’s a far cry from 2010, when the same communities had already received 75 mm and 121 mm, respectively.
Despite the positive start, Black said fields are still wet so rain could set things back significantly.
“This year will be a telltale year,” he said.
“If we don’t get that crop this year, the whole community is really going to suffer. Everybody got through 2010, but you can’t afford to have consecutive bad years, one on top of another. If you do, that’s when you start to see people dropping out.”
Further north, near Zenon Park, Sask., Francis Chabot said he is also pleased with how well the landscape has dried up.
Sloughs are full and farmers will be dodging low spots in most fields, but overall conditions are better than what many had expected.
“I think we’re cautiously optimistic at this point, certainly way more optimistic than we were two or three weeks ago,” said Chabot.
“We’ve still got lots of moisture, but we’re in phenomenally good shape, compared to what we were all of last summer. In that regard we’re optimistic, but the caution is related to how much rain we get this spring.”
Zenon Park received approximately 950 mm of rain last year, about triple what is normally expected.
Most growers in the northeast had a promising start last year as well, but repeated rains shut things down for good after a few days of seeding in early May.
Most farmers in Chabot’s area seeded less than half their normal acreage and much of that was written off.
Chabot said grain and oilseed producers are looking for a two-week window to seed this year’s crop.
Seeding is usually in full swing by the third week of May in a normal year. Producers hope they can stick to that timeline in 2011, but they’ll be watching forecasts anxiously.
“If we don’t get any adverse weather in a two-week period, there’s a lot of seeding that gets done in this area,” Chabot said.
“Most guys are geared to cover their land pretty adequately.”
Black said canola acreage will likely be higher than average in the northeast if the weather co-operates this spring.
Producers in the area hope to make up for last year’s lower-than-expected revenues, which means most of the acres that went unseeded will likely go into canola.
Regardless of what is seeded, Black said a decent crop with near normal acres will be required to keep the creditors at bay.
“A guy doesn’t need a bumper crop, but it would be nice to get a good average crop … and we have to get those acres in.”
