(Resource News International) — Harvest operations in Alberta were essentially complete with only the odd field of canola left to combine, according to a crop specialist with the province’s Ag-Info Centre.
“Provincially, the harvest in Alberta is complete, with only a few fields of green canola left to be combined,” said Doon Pauly, a crop specialist with Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development’s information centre in Stettler, on Tuesday.
Producers left canola out in the field until last, hoping that the green from a killing frost in early September would have grown out, he said.
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“The general consensus among those producers is that the plan did not work.”
With the completion of the harvest, producers have been actively trying to get as much fall fieldwork done as possible, he said. “Conditions for this work have been ideal so far given that the weather has also co-operated.”
However, with prices for the various crops “tanking,” Pauly said producers have not been in any hurry to apply fall fertilizers.
“Had crop values remained at high levels, there would have been incentive, but as it stands, few producers are willing to take a chance,” he said.
There was also some disbelief among producers that fertilizer prices would remain high, he said, given the economic turmoil heading into next spring.
Topsoil and subsoil moisture conditions heading into the winter were seen as OK, but additional precipitation would be welcome ahead of the ground freezing up, Pauly said.
Winter wheat and fall rye acreage in Alberta were seen being significantly lower than normal given the lateness of the harvest this fall, he said.
