Manitoba Agriculture reports the province’s farmers have started this year’s harvest. Anne Kirk, a cereal crop specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, says warm dry weather over the past week has allowed the harvest to get underway.
We didn’t see much rainfall over the past seven days, except for the eastern region, which did have over an inch in some areas. For most of the rest of the province, we saw very little rainfall so crops are starting to mature quickly. In regions that had lots of moisture but not too much, I think we are going to be seeing quite good yields. It’s very spotty throughout the province. In some areas we’ve had a great amount of moisture, in some areas a bit too much and then in some areas a bit too little. In the areas that have had way too much moisture, we definitely see some patchy fields, so areas of the field that are drowned out and that will obviously majorly negatively affect the crop yields. Then in some fields they have nothing to harvest because they were completely drowned out but I think we will be seeing some really good yields in areas where they’ve had a good amount of moisture.
Right now, we’re seeing harvest starting in winter cereal crops, so fall rye and winter wheat throughout the province. That harvest is just starting off, so I don’t have yield reports at this time but throughout the province we are seeing a start to winter cereal harvest. We’re likely seeing a start of barley harvest. I’ve heard of a few locations in the central region where barley has been harvested and there’s likely fields in other regions as well. I’ve heard that yields are quite good for the barley that has come off, but I don’t have any numbers to report at this point. Oats have started to be swathed as well, so harvest will likely start quite soon. Then for canola, we’re seeing swathing for canola for sure in the central region and perhaps in other regions as well so some swathing, some harvesting and we’ll see more as the week progresses.
~ Anne Kirk, Manitoba Agriculture
Kirk notes there is rain in the forecast in some areas and if we do get rain, it will put a pause in the harvest but if it stays warm and dry, we can expect a bit of a jump in harvesting activity.
