Manitoba Agriculture is reporting the downgrading of cereals, canola and soybeans still in the fields due to prolonged rain.

Anne Kirk, a Cereal Crop Specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, says we saw variable precipitation across the province this past week but most of the northwest received pretty low accumulations and was able to get a good amount of harvest done while rain throughout the central, eastern and Interlake did delay harvest a bit.

This week we’re looking at about 51 percent of harvest completion as of Monday, September 28th and that compares with about 43 percent of harvest accumulation last week, so that was on September 21st. So, we did see a good increase in harvest over the last week and a lot of that was some canola and then more soybeans growing and certain parts of regions like the southwest and northwest did see some cereals being done as well.

Crop quality, it really depends on the crop that we’re talking about. For cereals and oil seeds like canola, we don’t want to see the crop sitting in the field for as long as it’s been sitting so, the later harvested spring cereals definitely see some quality downgrades due to weathering on the kernels, also sprouting. So, we are seeing quality downgrades at the elevator and then downgrades to feed as well with sprouting. And then also just extreme difficulty in actually harvesting that crop when there’s a lot of lodging or stem breakage in the field.

Canola would be similar. We have heard some reports of sprouting, regrowth and then some pod shatter and pod drop due to the length of time that the canola has been sitting out there. Then some of those windy days are causing more pod shatter and pod drop. Also, more lodging in canola is making harvest conditions difficult as well.

So tough harvest conditions for those cereal and oilseed crops that were ready to harvest a while ago that have been sitting out in the field. Then, when it comes to soybeans, soybeans are in good shape and we haven’t heard any issues so far.

~ Anne Kirk, Manitoba Agriculture

Kirk says harvest has been at a standstill in some areas of the province but, if we do get some drier conditions, we would hope to see a big increase in canola acres and then a big push on soybeans as well.