“I’m hoping that you would have had your planter in the shop over winter … and you would have done your inspections on gauge wheel arms, gauge wheels, things like that,” said Eric Bossuyt, account manager with AgWest in Russell, Man.

Ideally, storing a planter in a shop makes inspections easier and keeps it out of the weather, but that’s not always possible.

Bossuyt added that operators should also inspect meter units to make sure seals are intact. Adding some graphite lube to the seed disc while they’re in there also helps to keep them spinning smoothly.

Hose connections should be given a close look to make sure they are secure and that no splits have occurred while in storage, especially if the planter was stored outside.

Bossuyt said ultraviolet light weakens plastic hoses over time when exposed to the sun and can lead to holes, resulting in vacuum loss within the system.

Preparing for downtime

No matter how well prepared you may be when planting season begins, malfunctions or breakdowns can happen in the blink of an eye.

Bossuyt said that a common trouble spot for growers at planting season is poor singulation.

This is often caused by a hole in a hose causing vacuum loss or worn internal parts on the meters themselves, whether your doubles eliminator is worn or the seed disc is having some issues if it’s too tight.”

“Maybe you’re getting surging with the V-drive. Stuff like that can cause missed singulation.”

It may end up being as simple as a misplaced wire or poor contact point, but it’s better to protect your seeding time in the field and check components later.

“That’s going to cause you downtime to try and diagnose what’s going on in the field,” added Bossuyt.

To prepare for these situations, he recommended having at least one spare row for the row unit to swap out individual parts if they malfunction.

“Every module, you should have one spare. That way, you’re not running to the dealership for one little finicky module,” said Bossuyt.

It’s easier to do a quick swap to keep running and the producer can always check on it later if the part is dead or if a contact point wasn’t connecting properly.

Bossuyt also said operators should check their on and off times every season to avoid misses in the field.

These can be caused by technology changes, such as a guidance system, which can lead to poor communication between equipment.

“The hertz might change and you might have frequency issues” said Bossuyt.

Getting started, setups

Before hitting the field, a test run closer to home is always a good idea in case a repair or a part swap-out is needed.

“Pull out the planter and simulate planting,” said Bossuyt.

“Run a few seeds out in the yard, fill it up, do whatever. You just want to make sure all your sensors are working, all your meters are running.”

Bossuyt said this is also a good time to check singulation and GPS timing and to ensure the on and offs are operating as intended.

Any fine tuning can be done in the field once you’ve confirmed everything is in good working order.

Ensuring good seed-to-soil contact should also be done once you’re in the field.

Bossuyt said the biggest thing equipment operators can do in this instance is to get out of the tractor cab.

“Not everybody wants to hear that, but we’ve got to get out,” said Bossuyt,

“We’ve got to be checking if the sun’s beating down and soil is drying up. We might need to adjust our depth or adjust our closing pressure, things like that.”

The practice has rearranged the farming landscape above and below ground by capturing carbon, improving moisture retention and allowing for a continuous cropping cycle.

However, over time, scientists, engineers and farmers have reinvented the wheel and found ways to improve the system, depending on their goals. In the last couple years, that conversation has turned to increasing soil moisture and conserving what’s already there.

Jeff Schoenau, Ministry of Agriculture Strategic Research Program Chair in soil nutrient management and professor of soil science at the University of Saskatchewan, said there are a few great ways to increase and conserve moisture.

READ ALSO: Producers aim to improve minimum-tilled soil

These improvements are simple things: increasing organic matter, keeping high stubble, direct seeding, maintaining a good residue mat and addressing compaction.

”Thinking along the lines, as well of residue or straw management, is thinking about leaving enough stubble height there that you’re going to be able to trap some snow that comes over the winter period,” he said.

“That aids in amount of moisture that you can store in the soil for the crop for the upcoming season. And also, the other thing about having that standing stubble there, is that it also helps reduce the wind speed close to the soil surface, and that helps to reduce the evaporation.”

However, what are the best ways to do that?

There’s different pieces of equipment, different crop management products and a variety of services and tests, all intended to help a producer who wants to improve their farming practices.

Additional considerations include having proper weed control to not deplete moisture, having a good crop rotation and establishing a forage stand.

One area to look at is minimum till seeding, and many options are available to producers who are looking to improve their practices. Some of the latest include double disc seeders, coulter drills and low disturbance shank drills.

K-Hart

K-Hart sells a double disc, known as the Spyder drill, specifically for seeding into high stubble and lots of residue as well retaining moisture.

The machine is ideal for pairing with stripper headers and is a good fit for producers who use crop residue as a runoff catch. It’s outfitted with a 17-inch blade and a 15-inch blade, both set at 22.5 degrees, and it nearly entirely eliminates hairpinning.

“A single disc drill has a lot of problems in heavier soils, where they push the soil sideways to create a sidewall,” said Erron Leafloor, K-Hart’s head of engineering.

“Your root growth is limited because of that…. Having gone to two blades and putting this angle, we don’t have that side wall compaction. So, you don’t create that wall of concrete beside the seed. And so, you give it a better start, especially if the roots have to go laterally to get to fertilizer on, like, a mid-row banding system.”

The 17-inch blade acts as a coulter, cutting through residue, breaking soil and pushing it — as well as stubble — out of the way of the drill, while the 15-inch opens a slit in the ground for the seed followed by the packer wheel to close it up.

Because of the angle the blades run at, it places the seed at an angle that offers it various paths to sprout.

“Ideally, it’s going to go straight up, but if you over pack, it’s got this trench, it can go sideways and up through the slit,” said Leafloor.

“But if it dries out and that opens up, like in a heavy clay, which will happen, that’s not above the seed, it’s off to the side of the seed.”

K-Hart is the only company in North America that has a drill with such a design, but that doesn’t mean other drills can’t help improve minimum till methods.

Pillar

Pillar’s Stealth Flex drill transports easily, contours to hills and lows and works “pretty smooth” on high stubble and residue.

“You can confidently leave whatever you can in your fields without having to work it,” said Jagger Bron, Pillar’s Alberta territory sales manager.

“And (you can) keep that soil down and keep the water in there.”

It sports a grass shield to help push aside stubble, a short, shank-like seed boot and a disc for fertilizer, meaning it’s a bit more disturbance than the typical no-till seeding system.

However, it’s proven successful in situations where stripper headers have been used and when there’s a thick mat to get through.

“We sold five drills this year in southern Alberta just to guys that got hailed out and didn’t want to do any tilling,” Bron said.

“So, no work on the field. (It went) right through, and it’s honestly some of the most beautiful canola I’ve ever seen.”

Part of this can be contributed to the weight of the drill, which weighs approximately 60,000 pounds with a mostly cast design. The other help comes from the design of the openers.

“Our ‘mark two’, so our last openers and our first ones … they both had springs underneath, so it was kind of a pull. So, going to the (new) push design, you get way more even down pressure.”

Bourgault

Another option for seeding drills with good pressure is from Bourgault.

Each machine it offers has the option of quick depth adjust (QDA) and heavy weight. The best option for minimum till in its lineup is the Paralink Coulter Drill with the ParaLink Walking opener, which has a single disc at a compound angle paired with a scraper and followed with a packer wheel.

The compound angle helps penetrate the ground and can easily go deeper into the soil, which reduces seed hairpinning.

However, the main benefit of this configuration is the ease of planting in high stubble and thick residue, while also being able to apply fertilizer through the mid-row bander, which helps with moisture conservation.

“The whole idea with a seeding coulter, its advantages are getting through tall residue.… You can seed in the stripper header stubble,” said Curtis Hinrichsen, a Bourgault territory sales manager.

“So that’s conserving moisture that way, also capturing snow in the wintertime. And this will seed through that.”

Pairing the mid-row bander also reduces the amount of passes made in the field, which is important for limiting additional tillage and compaction. Bourgault uses the diamond configuration of mid-row bander and openers, which keeps the seed safe from high rates of nitrogen.

“Every second row will have a mid-row between two seed openers,” Hinrichsen said.

“On this drill, this is a 10-inch spaced drill. That mid-row comes between them two (openers) five inches apart.”

The goal is to place the fertilizer directly in the middle of every other seeded row. With the mid-row bander only at the front of the drill, this places them 20-inches apart and makes it easier to get through heavy residue because the implements are further apart.

The mid-row bander is also available on the Paralink Hoe Drill, which is a bit more disturbance than the Coulter. However, Henrichson said it is the most popular option when paired with the mid-row bander. It’s outfitted with a single hoe point, QDA and packer wheels.

Henrichson said its popularity is due to less maintenance than coulter discs, but added it’s not great if planting into high stubble.

“(Stubble will) wrap around and plug and you’ll be lifting your shanks and swinging around. It’s going to be a problem,” he said.

“So, they certainly have to cut instead of stripper head stubble…. I always encourage if they buy a 12 inch drill, cut their stubble 11 inches. If they buy a 10 inch spaced drill, cut their stubble nine inches.”

Southern Alberta remained furthest along with planting reaching 97 per cent finished, advancing 10 points on the week. The northwest climbed 20 points, reaching 93 per cent done, followed by the central region at 89 per cent seeded on a gain of 16 points. The province’s northeast reached 86 per cent in the ground, up 22 points and the Peace leapt forward 23 points at 84 per cent complete.

By major crop, the planting of Alberta’s dry peas was virtually finished at 99 per cent, with the spring with at 97 per cent. Barley followed at 89 per cent done, the canola at 83 per cent and the oats at 74 per cent.

Provincewide crop emergence improved 26 points over the week, hitting 57 per cent. By region, the central was at 65 per cent, Peace at 64 per cent and the south at 62 per cent. Lagging behind were the northeast at 46 per cent and the northwest at 42 per cent.

As for surface soil moisture, the province was at 56 per cent good to excellent, down eight points from the previous week. The crop report noted that dry winds were largely responsible for the declines.

When it came to subsoil moisture levels, most of Alberta saw declines except for the central region which was up three points at 80 per cent good to excellent. A distant second was Peace at 52 per cent good to excellent but dropped 17 points on the week. The Peace was third at 50 per cent, the northeast at 41 per cent and the south at 39 per cent. Overall, the province was at 53 per cent.

“For most regions, seeding has gone really well, and that’s a really good start to the crop season,” said Kim Stonehouse, crops extension specialist with Saskatchewan Agriculture.

Seeding was 88 per cent complete as of May 26, which is ahead of both the five-year average of 82 per cent and the 10-year average of 85 per cent.

Cropland topsoil moisture is rated four per cent surplus, 65 per cent adequate and 27 per cent short.

There are dryness issues in the northeast and west-central portions of the province, but nothing a good rain can’t fix.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever seen somebody lose a crop in May,” said Stonehouse.

Three-quarters of the spring cereals, oilseeds and pulses are experiencing normal crop development.

Some crops in the northern part of the province are ahead of normal development due to early seeding and a lack of weather interruptions.

“It is also an indication of dry conditions. In dry conditions, plants can tend to speed up,” said Stonehouse.

He did not specifically ask his crop reporters about emergence, but some in the southeast reported good emergence, while others in the northeast said it appears patchy.

There has been minor insect and frost damage, but nothing to fret about.

“Wind and dry conditions are probably the things I would worry most about. They can cause the most damage and reduce yields drastically,” said Stonehouse.

“Warm, windy conditions dry the topsoil out very quickly, which will starve the plants of moisture.”

Seeding was 90 per cent complete in Alberta as of May 27, ahead of the five-year average of 81 per cent.

Crop emergence was 57 per cent, well above the five-year average of 37 perc ent.

“Although recent rainfall provided some short-term relief, warm and dry winds have led to reduced soil moisture levels,” said Roy Larsen, director of the statistics and data development section of Alberta Agriculture.

Surface moisture levels are rated 55.8 per cent good to excellent. That compares to the five-year average of 68.6 per cent.

“Without adequate moisture, this could become a concern for sustained crop and pasture development, but it’s early,” he said.

Manitoba got a good jump on seeding this year, which helped get things off to a nice start in that province.

“Crops are looking good in general across the province,” she said.

Seeding progress was 85 per cent complete as of May 27, which is well ahead of the five-year average of 69 per cent.

“For most crops when you seed earlier, we do have higher yield potential,” said Anne Kirk, cereal crops specialist with Manitoba Agriculture.

Winter wheat and fall rye survival and growth looks terrific. Fall rye is heading out.

Seasonal accumulations of rain in Manitoba were close to normal for the May 1-25 period.

The eastern region and eastern portions of the Interlake region had accumulations of less than 60 percent of normal.

However, the southwest and parts of the central region have received more than 150 percent of the 30-year average.

Spring cereal seeding is almost complete with some of the earliest planted crops already at the three-leaf to one-tiller stage of development.

Canola seeding was 76 per cent complete as of May 27.

“There have been some reports of flea beetles and some issues with canola emergence due to some crusting on the soil,” said Kirk.

Some peas are already in the two to three node stage of development.

“Emergence in general has been a little slow and a little stagey, just due to some of the drier conditions and the fluctuating temperatures,” she said.

Dryness is a concern in some parts of the northwest, Interlake and eastern regions, but there is standing water in some fields in the southwest.

“Most producers would be happy to have some rain,” said Kirk.

Stonehouse said now is a good time to remind farmers to be careful around hot equipment given the dry conditions in some regions of the Prairies.

“Keep a fire extinguisher handy or a water truck close by, if possible,” he said.