By Brian Konrad

Prolonged drought and smoke impacted district crops this year

Aug 27, 2021 | 4:03 PM

CYPRESS COUNTY, AB — The harvest is underway in our region, but it remains to be seem how much damage was done by heat, another year of drought and the encroachment of grasshoppers to the west.

Area farmer Nicole Neubauer says dryland producers are well underway with their harvest, with reported yields down around 75 per cent from what can normally be expected.

In some cases, producers are simply running the combine over the crop to establish a base line for crop insurance purposes.

But Neubauer says irrigated crops are slower to mature due to another weather condition this year.

“We’ve got a crop that’s really slow in ripening and I think that the smoke probably had a factor,” says Neubauer.

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“Even though it was warm, we didn’t have the UV, we didn’t have the sun intensity which maybe slowed up ripening for the cereal crops we have in irrigation,” according to Neubauer.

Neubauer says irrigated crops are typically longer seasoned because producers have the ability to make it rain when it doesn’t come naturally.

Looking past the harvest, Neubauer says soil conditions remain very dry with almost no reserve.

That causes concern for blowing soil and makes it harder to decide whether or not to seed a fall crop.

There’s a limited window and Neubauer figures producers need to decide if there’s enough moisture for seed to germinate and do that before it get too cold for germination, probably within six weeks time.

On the upside, widespread drought in other areas means prices for commodities have reached unseen levels, and producers with content will see better prices when selling their crop.