WWWI Video: Why Grow Winter Wheat. Do you agree with these farmers?

[Braveheart]

Re winter wheat, MBs winter wheat breeder, was adamant that the CWB monopoly had hurt varietal development. The proper market signals were never visible and didn't attract investment in winter wheat breeding.

In terms of returns, the general purpose wheats like Prosper have great yields and seem to have more demand for them than winter wheat.

[farmaholic]

Its amazing what people will tolerate. When you lived and farmed in one spot your whole life and "don't know any better". Judging by some of the reported yields, I doubt some people would be satisfied farming here.

I may never achieve some of the bin busters talked about here but ironically I had some 60bu/ac durum a couple of years ago and the next year did nothing different and got sub 30 (fuzz infected) spring wheats....had the odd fifty-ish, did nothing different on my part this year and yields are mid to high 20s, kinda makes me nauseous. We were always lucky enough to sc**** off something, never seem to get completely skunked. Things can regularly go either way here. Wheat at least looks good and never spent a nickel on fungicides....didn't need to.

Sorry for straying off topic.

[Braveheart]

Tom, all relevant points re winter wheat.

The other thing we've run into here is wheat streak mosaic from winter wheat volunteers as well as downy brome which grows the same cycle as winter wheat.

[Braveheart]

Farmaholic, I wish this was the new normal. The lowest yield I've heard in this area is 65 on spring wheat. The rest of our spring wheat is not as strong as this field. They're also not as flat.

[MBgrower]

Agree with bravehaeart. Newer hrs varieties like cardale yielded as good or better than latest red winter varities. My cardale ran from 75 to 83 bpa this year, #1 grade, faller wheat ran 85,also #1 grade, however i am disappointed with that yield. Protein on cardale is 15.2%, faller 13.1%. Local fields of Ac emerson red winter yielded 65 to 70 and proteins of 9-10.5. I have grown rw for 15 years, 2014 was the last time on this farm, that is unless quality, yield, and winter survival can improve. Plus there is little suitable stubble to seed into, as canola is quickly going the way of Blackberry. One other point, red winter varieties typically are priced the same or worse than feed wheat, if can grow 95 bpa pastuer wheat, why would i grow 70 bpa winter wheat. Manitoba agriculture stated rw is the most profitable crop in mb. Shows you how out of touch these ndp employees are.

[Braveheart]

One usual benefit of rotating to winter wheat gives is that it should provide a year that you wouldn't have to use wild oat spray thereby helping delay resistance.

One more strike against is that it takes A LOT of carefully timed N for any yield.

[Jay-mo]

Saving money on wild oat herbicide is not a good idea when you have winter killed areas and drowned out spots. Save now, pay later!!
The best ww crop I ever had was written off by insurance, got a nice check. Then put in canola and harvested a really nice crop! cha-ching!
Now that they only pay for reseeding it makes it less attractive.

[wakopa]

Hmmm with those nice yields and wheat over 7 dollars, rent should be at lest 100 dollars an acre.

[furrowtickler]

They all bring up good points , we have grown winter wheat with very good results and not.
Harvesting dry wheat in mid August and delivering it all it a huge thing - fill up hoppers then ship er out quick.
But .... Winter kill is still a problem in this area , like a few others here said spring wheat yeilds are not far off. In this area we only get canola off in time every second year - maybe. Winter kill areas become a mess later. Seeding at harvest can go smooth or be a train wreck - depends on weather and labour.
We pushed seeding canola too early to try to fit winter wheat - that can be far more costly here.
It has a fit if you are across the southern grain belt and can normally get canola / mustard off by mid to late August . I would not seed winter wheat on any other type of stubble . We tried on pea stubble - it was wiped out .
Our best was just under 100 bus/ac at $6
Our worst was 45 bus/ac at $4.5
Around here winter wheat is like pasture - no rain in May or June means no crop

[sumdumguy]

What do you know about winter Canola?