Seeds lost to strong winds | Pre-emergence burnoff key to getting ahead of the problem for producers
Farmers throughout much of the Prairies are preparing to do battle with a yellow menace this year.
Canola volunteers are expected to be out in full force once spring finally arrives due to extreme wind that tossed around swaths and caused extensive pod shattering during last year’s harvest.
Many communities in east-central Alberta and west-central Saskatchewan were hit by wind gusts of up to 100 km-h last September.
Other regions of the Prairies experienced sustained winds of 50 to 80 km-h that resulted in canola seed landing in the field instead of the combine hopper.
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The worst damage occurred in Saskatchewan, where half of the province’s canola crop was sitting in swaths when the winds swept up.
“Shattering losses were significant all the way from Meadow Lake to north of Yorkton and even down towards Regina,” said Grant McLean, cropping specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture.
Dale Leftwich, director of the Saskatchewan Canola Development Commission, said canola is typically seeded at four to five pounds of seed per acre. One bushel of canola contains 50 lb. of seed.
“If you lost two bushels of canola, you have seeded enough for 20 years of canola,” he said.
“It’s going to be a huge problem and it’s going to have to take some careful consideration in terms of how to deal with it.”
Troy Prosofsky, a DeKalb agronomist for northwestern Saskatchewan, said many farmers lost five bu. an acre or more to the strong winds.
“In those instances, they would have up to 250 lb. of canola on an acre. Will all of those germinate? No they won’t. But there will be a large number of them,” he said.
That means growers need to be extra-vigilant with their pre-emergence burnoff activity this spring.
Elaine Bellamy, who farms near Rosebud, Alta., plans to do just that. Her canola fields produced half of the usual 50 to 70 bu. per acre last year due to a combination of sclerotinia and wind damage.
“We have a strong pre-burn program that we do and I don’t anticipate (volunteers) being a problem,” she said.
Bellamy plans to use a pre-burn with a residual herbicide on her cereal fields, to treat all cereal seed with a high quality fungicide and to plant at high seeding rates.
Clark Brenzil, provincial weed specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture, has a few tips for growers: do their pre-seed herbicide work as soon as possible, use tank-mix herbicide combinations with modes of action to which the canola is susceptible and increase water rates on their sprayers to ensure complete coverage.
He said the good thing about all the volunteer canola is that there will be inner-species competition.
“They’re not going to be as vigorous on the whole as the individuals that would be from lower populations,” he said.
The bad news is that the volunteers will be so plentiful in some areas that they will provide a thick curtain that the crop will have to fight through in the spring.
“The challenge it provides for management is to be able to hit each and every one of those small seedlings that are there,” said Brenzil.
Research from the University of Saskatchewan shows producers can achieve a significant yield bump by spraying well before seeding rather than just before seeding.
Following this advice with wheat provided a four bu. per acre yield increase, which worked out to a 10 percent hike.
“Your priority on days when you can spray should be spraying rather than seeding,” said Brenzil.
That is especially true in a year like this one when canola volunteers are expected to be so plentiful.
“When you have that high density, it’s more important to control them earlier in their life stage than letting them sit there and suck up resources,” he said.
Tank mixes will be important this spring because nobody knows exactly what they’re dealing with. A neighbour’s Roundup Ready canola may be sitting in what was a field of LibertyLink canola.
Fields planted to cereal crops could be sprayed with a mixture of glyphosate and a Group 4 phenoxy herbicide such as 2,4-D or MCPA.
Those seeded to pulses or canola should be treated with a combination of glyphosate and a Group 14 herbicide.
Growers using carfentrazone products such as Aim, CleanStart, Authority Charge and BlackHawk need to use high rates to control volunteer canola because they have to assume the glyphosate will have no effect on the canola plants. Carfentrazone doesn’t provide residual control.
Saflufenacil, which is the ingredient in BASF’s Heat, is another Group 14 herbicide that may give growers another week of control at high rates because it does have a residual property. It can be used ahead of peas, lentils, wheat, chickpea, oats, barley and corn.
Producers should also move to the higher end of the recommended application water rates this spring.
“In order to make contact with each and every one of those plants, they have to maybe keep their water volumes way higher than what they have been,” said Brenzil.
That is especially true when using Group 14 herbicides, which are contact products that only kill what they’re directly sprayed on.
Prosofsky said there is a good chance growers will face a late flush of canola volunteers despite their spring control efforts.
“Multiple applications may be required to really control the volunteer canola plants,” he said.
Leftwich said farmers are going to be spending more than they usually do on herbicides this year. However, they could be paying an even bigger price if they can’t get out in their fields to spray because of wind, rain or temperature.
“If you end up being late in your spraying and the volunteers are choking our your crop, you can lose a huge amount of money in a very short period of time,” he said.
