Friday Crop Report on a Thursday!

[sumdumguy]

Is there light at the end of the tunnel, Bigzee? You done yet?

[iceman]

The private insurance owners are currently in meetings with the government to bail them out ...and they will get it because they can say they were helping farmers...

ViterraSWP hacks are at the government doorstep for sure. ....all going cap in hand to the government...

Interesting

[bigzee]

Is there light at the end of the tunnel, Bigzee? You done yet?

Not done!
What’s left is flat. Not fun! Usually roll everything but didn’t this year. 👎👎👎
Would like to say the end is insight, it’s getting closer everyday though. Just very slow going.
Trying to do 200 ac per day with 3 combines is a chore. Oh well hopefully weather holds.

[woodland]

Really? they don't base it on your last 5 or 7 years yields? that seems odd. We get a flyer through the mail every year that shows crop yield by crop/variety/RM which seems to reflect what MASC bases their insurance coverage on - ie the 52.6bu average yield I quoted in my example compares to the RM average of 50bu shown in the flier for 2015 year (the only one I had to hand).

My pet peeve with crop insurance is around winter feed for animals. The Ag department has spent untold sums through extension over the years encouraging ranchers to use extensive feeding methods - bale grazing, corn grazing, swath grazing etc as they are cheaper, involve less fossil fuel use and keep the nutrients in the field. Yet crop insurance penalizes you if you practice any of these through the wildlife program. If we get crop damage (elk around here) we get compensated for that upon inspection of loss - but only up until the time that a corn crop would normally be harvested for silage. So if we choose to corn graze as they advise us to do we lose the right to compensation for wildlife damage because we didn't harvest it at the time for silage.
That's my biggest risk right now - we choose to silage our corn because of uncompensated elk damage if we corn grazed. This year it looks like we will be unable to silage it due to conditions so will have to graze it instead. When the annual migration of @300 elk past my place happens soon what do we do? we're not allowed to shoot them but I can't afford for them to eat my winter feed supply.

Totally agree with you on the wildlife. Last I checked when a stray cat shows up in the barn and starts eating my kitty chow it’s mine. If the queen wants her wildlife she better fence them in, pay me for feeding them, or allow me to “control” them. Whenever someone asks for hunting permission I say they can take however many of whatever they’d like. I don’t care or ask if they have a tag for them or not due to the damage they cause us.



2016 we made 800 acres of “snolage” after the white stuff showed up and didn’t leave. All sorts of bizarre issues that you don’t think of like shovelling the hood of the discbine off several times a day after it builds up with 500 lbs of snow/ ice crystals. Instead of spinning in the mud we spun out on frozen hills instead. Almost put tire chains the chopper tractor and the trucks. Silage piles not getting warm/ heating for a week so no hurry in covering them at least.

Snowed after raining overnight and could’ve been done by Tuesday when the weather is supposed to fall apart. Still can’t get more than two “workable” days in a row here.

My son and his cousin are baling and combining up everything in the house. I told them to hurry so they could do mine next since Ma Nature isn’t playing nice ............ again.

[grassfarmer]

So what kind of silage did that make? Obviously it was very wet but i'm wondering too the effect of making silage once its a lot colder outside. Does it ferment less but still keep Ok? We are at the other end of the spectrum in that the corn would likely be too dry by the time the ground freezes and we can get to it. Would it generate enough heat to ensile or spoil of would it be a bit like keeping it in a fridge?

[woodland]

It made ok silage. The bigger issue was how much the crop degraded while standing. It was all oats with underseeded alfalfa so a thin stand that the snow didn’t flatten it much. Every bushel we managed to get off was soggy so we just piled it and fed it to spruce up the mediocre feed. Most of these fields were far from home and fences so grazing wasn’t an option.

Is your custom crew not coming or they don’t figure they can get it done in those ugly conditions?



After the killing frost our corn all layed over at 5-6 feet and we swathed some but it was way less fluffy than we expected. Not sure what the snow would do to this if we left it but imagine it would continue breaking down?

[grassfarmer]

Woodland I don't think enough harvesting capacity exists in Manitoba to handle the corn crop in a season as poor as this. It's often a stretch to get it done in a good year before winter sets in. Some crews only use tandems and semis and neither of them can go in mud conditions. I think our corn is just too dry already anyways so we will graze it instead. Now if we can just design/find/buy a ration for the backgrounders.
Our corn is still largely standing but it's brown already - maybe we should swath it too as there would be less risk of losing the leaves that way. Easier to cross fence but not so nice if we get 3 feet of frozen snow on top of it.

Your corn won't change much now - turn brown and crisp but it doesn't weather much. Depends on variety but if its Pioneer it'll stay as hard, and be as edible as, bamboo canes.