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Frost having minimal damage on crops at this point

Sep 19, 2013 | 1:18 PM

The temperature around Saskatchewan has started to dip back into fall-like temperatures and producers around the region are beginning to worry about frost.

Daphne Cruise, regional crop specialist for Saskatchewan Agriculture, said the frost being seen right now, for the majority of the crops in the Prince Albert area, are having minimal damage on crops.

“There are some exceptions I think where the crop was seeded a bit on the later side and any kind of growing condition that those producers faced that put the crops behind, we may see some things like bran frost on cereals or some of the flax crops as well because it was seeded probably last. We might see a little frost damage on those crops but for the most part I think it should be fairly minimal at this point,” Cruise said.

So far, producers in the northeast aren’t reporting any issues, but Cruise said the temperature did dip down to -1 C on the eastern side of the province but so far producers haven’t noticed a lot of crop damage.

“Right now the focus is to get the crop in the bin and I know that the northeast region and Prince Albert areas had some pretty good combining weather these last several weeks so it’s allowed them to catch up a little bit … hopefully some dry weather continues for those areas to try and get the majority of the crop in the bin,” she continued.

Cruise said areas west and southwest of Prince Albert conditions are quite dry, so “some livestock producers in those areas are just keeping an eye on pastures and hopefully a rain event in the next little while wouldn’t hurt those livestock producers, just to finish off the tail-end of the grazing season before the cattle have to come home.”

“Any kind of light frost at this point should do minimal damage. If it’s a killing frost there are some concerns there, little more of a quality issues but our indications from crop reporters in the Prince Albert and northeast region is that the majority of the crop is mature enough that any significant frost event shouldn’t do a whole lot of damage at this point,” Cruise explained.

She said there are a number of factors that will determine how frost will affect a crop, she said with frost it depends on how low the temperature gets and how long it stays at that temperature.

For crops, it depends on how far advanced they are.

“The last month and a half has definitely allowed producers to catch up. When you look at the northeast region we’re sitting at 39 per cent of the crop combined, and that puts us ahead of the five-year average of 33 per cent,” she finished.

swallace@panow.com

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