Friday Crop Report on a Thursday!

[furrowtickler]

Another by Wakaw..


That’s a crazy amount of hail

[furrowtickler]

[furrowtickler]

Yet there is still the attitude that farming is easy ….

[Old Cowzilla]

No printable words can describe that wow !

[foragefarmer]

I hear ya. Trust me, I feel almost guilty coming on here and saying that I'm frighteningly dry...

The one thing that seems common though is the cool nature of the weather. I keep thinking the only blessing so far is that we haven't had a string of 80* days with a SW wind. It has been cool, and generally cloudy which keeps the evaporation down. Now... that's a blessing for us, and a curse for you guys. It could turn into a curse here though if it doesn't get its shit figured out because with how dry it is, if we have a system push through here in the next couple weeks there's no moisture to keep temperatures above zero.

All I know is it seems like no-one that's a semi-regular poster on here is "excited" about the conditions this spring. Are there individuals that have kept quiet for whom the stars have aligned and they're absolutely pumped about how things look?

In guys travels have they seen or heard from friends that are in "the sweet spot"? How big is it? In another couple or three weeks, we're going to start making yield projections, and if the wet is still wet, and the dry still dry, it'll be dismal!

I've been reading your posts the past year regarding the dry conditions you have been enduring on your farm.

Hoping you get the rain you so badly need and pull off a good crop.

Sounds like your blessed with a wonderful young family. No matter how tough it is on the farm, at the end of the day family makes us all truly happy.


No sweet spot here with well over 5 inches in less than month.

Good luck to you and all others on here and hopefully this fall we'll hear about the successful harvest everybody had.

[Hamloc]

I hear ya. Trust me, I feel almost guilty coming on here and saying that I'm frighteningly dry...

The one thing that seems common though is the cool nature of the weather. I keep thinking the only blessing so far is that we haven't had a string of 80* days with a SW wind. It has been cool, and generally cloudy which keeps the evaporation down. Now... that's a blessing for us, and a curse for you guys. It could turn into a curse here though if it doesn't get its shit figured out because with how dry it is, if we have a system push through here in the next couple weeks there's no moisture to keep temperatures above zero.

All I know is it seems like no-one that's a semi-regular poster on here is "excited" about the conditions this spring. Are there individuals that have kept quiet for whom the stars have aligned and they're absolutely pumped about how things look?

In guys travels have they seen or heard from friends that are in "the sweet spot"? How big is it? In another couple or three weeks, we're going to start making yield projections, and if the wet is still wet, and the dry still dry, it'll be dismal!

Helmsdale there is no doubt your area was drier than mine last year. So far since May 1 we have had just over an inch of moisture, so we have enough in the soil to germinate the crop. It certainly has been cool which has conserved what moisture we have. My concern is looking forward there is very little rain in the 2 week forecast. As well the rain that is forecasted is usually 5-7 days out and disappears by the time that day arrives. Unfortunately this year I will have very little hay carryover as I produced half of normal last year. We certainly need rain. Reading the posts and looking at the pictures of the areas that are waterlogged certainly shows how different the conditions are! We seeded through more low areas this year than we have in more than a decade. Here is hoping the conditions improve for everyone!

One quick additional note. Having lived in Alberta my whole life it quite often amazes how little I know about the different areas and towns in my province. As an example I never realized Helmsdale was the name of a town or hamlet in southeast Alberta. I bought a macdon swather at a farm sale about 3 years ago close to this area.

[agstar77]

Rain started seeding stopped. No go till Thursday at the earliest. Going to be a struggle for most to make crop ins deadline. We will need an open fall. Between dry in west and wet here this year will be a huge challenge. Good luck to all and stay safe. On a lighter note I was able to do some gardening but everything is behind by at least two weeks.

[SASKFARMER]

**** it's raining again total so far is almost a half-inch but it's moving NW out of the USA into our area when the yellow pops up on the radar look out.

[Guest]

3.5 tenths here
made it to 92%
lots of last stuff "mudded" in , will appreciate this rain
lots left to do in the area

[furrowtickler]

Hopefully this overall pattern changes very soon and the moisture starts coming through Alberta into Western Sask and let’s those drenched areas dry out in the east and Manitoba
If this pattern stays it will be no good for hardly anyone but small fringe areas in between.

[jazz]

Hopefully this overall pattern changes very soon and the moisture starts coming through Alberta into Western Sask and let’s those drenched areas dry out in the east and Manitoba
If this pattern stays it will be no good for hardly anyone but small fringe areas in between.

The recent Nutrien forecast that you sometimes post had continued flows out of Montana bisecting eastern sask and floating down into southern MB and then a southern US dry blocking pattern setting up into late June Early July that appears to feed some moisture into western canada.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMBgvIjAh24

[Chief]

Helmsdale there is no doubt your area was drier than mine last year. So far since May 1 we have had just over an inch of moisture, so we have enough in the soil to germinate the crop. It certainly has been cool which has conserved what moisture we have. My concern is looking forward there is very little rain in the 2 week forecast. As well the rain that is forecasted is usually 5-7 days out and disappears by the time that day arrives. Unfortunately this year I will have very little hay carryover as I produced half of normal last year. We certainly need rain. Reading the posts and looking at the pictures of the areas that are waterlogged certainly shows how different the conditions are! We seeded through more low areas this year than we have in more than a decade. Here is hoping the conditions improve for everyone!

One quick additional note. Having lived in Alberta my whole life it quite often amazes how little I know about the different areas and towns in my province. As an example I never realized Helmsdale was the name of a town or hamlet in southeast Alberta. I bought a macdon swather at a farm sale about 3 years ago close to this area.

Helmsdale was actually the name of a long since defunct one room school district. The close towns are oyen, cereal and acadia valley.

[Sodbuster]

We had .6” here, hopefully no rain today and some sun ☀️ tomorrow and start Monday afternoon. We’re not far from Wakaw so glad we missed that event but did have our power out for 14 hours. Sitting at the 85% done, forecast for the next week is mostly sunny ☀️ but the highest high is 16C for the week but don’t see the F word. It’s kind of nice to have Sunday mostly off, and get a bit of rest time, been working some long hours. Hopefully everyone’s forecast is good and we can resume seeding in a timely matter and finish this season on a high note, good luck everyone.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

I tried to upload a picture but it failed every time. Just before the long weekend, we had so much hail the ground was white. Chased me out of the field for quite a while.
I can't think of a better time of year to get a hail storm though. Much better than last year's early September hail storm.

[clubber83]

First pic at wakaw is a field of ours on the right. Canola was just poking out of ground. Still hail in the field this morning. Will have to wait a few days to assess. 2.5" of rain came with it. At my yard, 6 miles south of pic was barely 1/2" of rain.