A breakthrough in harvest progress, fuel prices, and reducing red tape

Thanks for tuning in to the Farmer Rapid Fire on RealAg Radio, brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada! On today’s show, your host, Lyndsey Smith, is joined by Leighton Kolk of Iron Springs, Alberta; Tim Oleskyn of Prince Albert, Saskatchewan; Aubrey Yule of Killarney, Manitoba; Marc Arnusch of Keenesburg, Colorado; and Pioneer agronomist Holly Loucas, based in Ontario! 00:00 - Coming up… 01:30 - Leighton Kolk of Iron Springs, Alta. 13:49 - Tim Oleskyn of Prince Albert, Sask. 26:49 - Aubrey Yule of Killarney, Man. 38:22 - Marc Arnusch of Keenesburg, Col. 47:55- Pioneer agronomist Holly Loucas based in Ontario Thoughts on something we talked about on the show? Connect with host Lyndsey Smith at lsmith@realagriculture.com, on X/Twitter by using the hashtag #RealAgRadio, or give us a shout on the response line, 1-855-776-6147. Trending This week on The Agronomists, Lyndsey Smith returns to the host seat to discuss fall weed control with guests Tyler Gullen of Nufarm and Rob Miller of BASF! Lyndsey, Tyler, and Rob unpack the fit for soil applied herbicides and the benefits of fall weed control. The Agronomists is brought to you by MNP, Black... Read more » It has not been an easy harvest, that is for sure. But this week on the Farmer Rapid Fire, we're going to check in, in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, even dip down to Colorado, and we're going to check in on just how poor things got, but why we're making some great progress. Let's go, let's listen to the Farmer Rapid Fire on RealAg Radio. This land isn't just in your blood, it's under your fingernails. And worn with pride. It's not a job, it's your livelihood. Here, overtime is all the time. But you wouldn't have it any other way. It's written into your DNA. It's what you thrive on. And while farming will never be easy, we can make it better. Introducing the Pioneer 100 Series. Meaningfully different canola hybrids. It's time for RealAg Radio on Rural Radio Channel 143 on SiriusXM. RealAg Radio and RealAgriculture.com are your home for insight and analysis of the issues that are impacting your farm business. Let's get real and get connected with RealAg Radio. Hello and welcome to RealAg Radio here on Rural Radio Channel 143 SiriusXM. It is October 1st and it is the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds. I'll be honest, I'm pretty excited about October. September was a bit of a blur. It was lovely, it was very dry, but I'm kind of ready for It's time for things to slow down a little outside. Bring on the spooky season, bring on the beautiful fall colours. I've said it before, but I'll say it again, Ontario in the fall is absolutely gorgeous, so bring it on. But it is, for many out there, especially in Western Canada, it has been an incredibly challenging harvest season. And thankfully this week we did see a bit of an improvement on the weather for many of our farmers, and that is going to be my top question this week as we go through. So we're going to start in Alberta, we'll hop to Saskatchewan, we'll also stop in Manitoba, and then we're actually going to go down to Colorado for our last farmer before hearing from Holly Lucas at the end of the show, who's right here in Ontario with me. So without further ado, let's hop to our first farmer, Leighton Kolk, out near Picture Butte, Alberta. All right, we head now to— well, we've got our Alberta farmer on the line. It's Leighton Kolk. Leighton, how you doing? Doing great, Lyndsey, doing great. Sunshine in here. Well, okay, so that is great news. What is keeping you busy this week? We just wrapped up canola seed combining, we got done that last Friday and then proceeded to have a half, 3/4 inch of rain out of nowhere, but thankfully that's in the bin. And Monday afternoon we started on chopping corn. We're, we're doing corn silage now. All right, now how is the silage going as far as tonnage? How's it looking? I've got 2, we're just on the into the second quarter here. I don't have exact numbers back, but we're, the moisture is running Beautiful, 68-69% moisture and the corn content looks fantastic, actually somewhat surprising, but we're north of 20 tonnes, but how far north I don't know. Yeah. That's just an estimate right now, but we had 3 below on Sunday night, So some of our corn, some of our corn's kind of turning. We're gonna have to, we're gonna have to hammer down if, uh, if it's starting to, you know, with that frost, it's definitely drying up a bit. Yeah, so I guess that's the— I mean, you're making silage, yes, but you need it to be enough, wet enough, right, to ensile properly. So if it starts drying down on you quick, you gotta hustle. 100%, that's the ideal target is right where we are today. So we're going into our hardest hit frost fields today and try and mow them off today and tomorrow, and then some of our land closer to the feedlot is just a little higher land and the frost didn't hit it. So we're— it's looking good, it's really looking good. That's good. Now you said the corn parts, so the cob part of the silage, sort of surprising. Why do you, why would you be surprised? What kind of season did you end up having? Well, because June was so wet here, you know, we had 13 inches of rain on the corn and not a lot of heat units, and we were thinking that's going to hurt us on the crop side, and thankfully July kicked in and had some pretty good heat and some warm nights, and that That must have really caught us up because we're doing kernel counts and I don't know, our combine corn looks like it might creep up to 200 bushels an acre maybe. Yeah. It's looking quite good, so we're surprised because we had a touch of hail, had a cool June with more moisture than we're used to, and just expected to not be, uh, setting any records. I don't know if we will, but it's looking better than we thought. We will take better than expected pretty much anytime it's offered. Yeah, we will take it. Now, um, now I have been out to your area a time or two, and you are silaging corn, um, but other crops get used for silage as well. Why, why is corn the, the crop of choice for silage for your farm? Well, we try and spread our risk a bit, Lyndsey. So actually, we do fall rye, fall triticale for one yard, and then the other yard we do corn, and it's for rotation reasons a lot, and also with heavier manoeuvred land, Lots of nitrogen, you can lay crops, cereal crops down, whereas corn will gobble the nitrogen up and use it all and not go flat on you. So we're kind of a risk management, we grow all corn except what if you get an early frost or early snowstorm, now you've got all your crop vulnerable to a harvest disaster, you know, so That's why we try and grow 50% as a fall crop, which we can chop in July and then actually come back in and plant some oats for just a little supplemental tonnage, and then we can risk it all on the other half because we know we won't run out of feed. Right, so I don't know, I hear kind of a couple layers of risk management in there, so obviously To your point, lodging is a risk, but season is a risk, and by putting something in in the fall, you also sort of COVID some of those bases too, as far as maybe having a nasty spring that turns on you too. 100%, Lyndsey. It is so nice to have 8 or 10 quarters seeded in the fall, and in case it's a wet sloppy spring, that them crops are already off to the races and it spreads out your workload because we've got enough things going on in the spring already and to know that there's a bunch of acres already going to town, it really helps spread out workload. Yeah. And yeah, you know, take advantage a little bit of local crop conditions or our environment, our country, the grass starts growing on our lighter soil in end of March, so kind of fall ryes, they follow the grasses, so they're turning green and starting to pop in the end of March, and well, corn, shucks, you don't see that till May. Yeah, absolutely, and you're right, the frost or the cooler temps corn does not like, so we've got to think about that one as well. Okay, so Leighton, you've gone over it, so of course you're in the canola seed business, you've got the feedyard, you've got silage being made. My question this week is sort of inspired by Parliament starting to sit again, we've got all sorts of things going on. Is there a particular rule or red tape or administrative hurdle that if you could just make go away, you would? Is there a particular red tape that you were like, could we just get rid of this? Oh boy, you caught me. Like, the first one really that comes to mind is more related to the beef side of our operation and the crops, but we struggle to get enough labour in the feedlot side of our business. A lot of people enjoy farming and it's, you know, we can always find people to operate equipment, but to make good cowboys and good cowgirls, you know, it's a 7-day-a-week thing. Anyways, the thing we hear all this chatter about, oh, we gotta slow immigration down and we took too many people in and all these things. Mm-hmm. But boy, are we getting the runaround on trying to bring in the foreign workers, like people from Mexico and Brazil and Ukraine. Well, not Ukraine, but, you know, we're just struggling, and there's people that want to come, they want to work, and it's like the government just turned the tap off. Mm-hmm. We just, we can't get PRs, we can't get LMIAs, we can't get work permits. It's a struggle. So kind of a little different than what you hear on the, on the math, you know, this, the media side, you hear a lot of, oh, we gotta stop this, they're taking advantage of this system. And the people we're bringing in, they aren't. They're bringing value, not taking value. Well, and I think too, to that point, This also, you know, we were sort of assured at the outset that, you know, this shouldn't negatively impact access for agriculture, but I'm not sure how that was ever supposed to happen. So duly noted, we're going to note that one. That's a really good one, Leighton, because I definitely know you're not alone on that one either. So definitely something to— if we could, we would fix all that. Okay, we'll leave it there. Thank you so much for making time for us this week. Really appreciate it. Thank you. That's great, Lyndsey, great to talk to you. We hope to start combining corn in 10, 10, 15 days and we'll let you know how that's going. Sounds great. All right, thank you to Leighton and we're going to take a quick break here on the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds and we'll be back right after this. Hey, what you looking at out there? Huh? Oh, nothing. Uh, didn't you say that like a week ago? Still true. When you own the ground in fall, your soil-active herbicide is already in place, waiting for spring, waiting for weeds. I'll leave you to it. Beautiful. Fierce MTZ by Vecta Volterra. Visit newfarm.ca. The Canola School on RealAgriculture.com is your one-stop shop for everything a canola grower needs. Check out our free video series on YouTube for all the latest in canola agronomy, research, marketing, and more. Don't have time to watch? Download the podcast version of The Canola School on RealAgriculture.com or anywhere you download your podcasts. Stay on top of all things canola with The Canola School on RealAgriculture.com. RealAgriculture.com, brought to you by BASF and InVigor hybrid canola. My name is Derek, owner-operator of 16 Grains. Hi, this is Kyle Deck. I farm in Sedley, Saskatchewan. If you're hearing this at harvest time and going up and down those straight lines, I just encourage you to keep going. What we go through, most people couldn't do for a month, and we do this for 7 months of the year. Just remember why we're doing this. that you can control. Take it safe and good luck. Learn from your mistakes today and be better tomorrow. All of us farmers are with you. Canterra Seeds, proudly farmer-owned. Welcome back to RealAg Radio here on Rural Radio Channel 143 SiriusXM. I am your host, Lyndsey Smith. It is Thursday, October 1st, and that means it is the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds. We head now to, well, it's northern Saskatchewan, everybody. Let's hop to it. We travel now to near Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, which I'm so excited to catch up with Mr. Tim Oleksen. Tim, how are you? You know, Miss Lyndsey, there is very little things we would change in our world. We're doing well, absolutely well, other than, other than, you know, the fuel truck showed up this morning, right? Everything's gone, things have gone well until that showed up, and it was like, yeah, Yeah, it takes a little, you know, downside of your step, Dave, but either way, yeah, it was okay. I mean, you need the fuel, you just don't need the bill. Yeah, okay, yeah, that's a mixed message. Yeah, you gotta pay, you gotta pay our bills or, you know, they'll put our picture up in the post office, and we've been there before. So there you go. Okay, now Tim, for those listening I want them to go and look on a map on where Prince Albert is, but you were quite far north in Saskatchewan. What kind of summer did you get? You know, it was mixed. I mean, it was like other areas. I mean, no doubt that, you know, the spring was, you continued to look out the window and the snow never ended, and, you know, it was those challenges, and then the summer, you know, lots of rain at the start that created so many problems through seeding, and And it was just always worrisome, and you know, we're a mature operation here, you know, Lyndsey, and so, you know, we've learned to, you know, drink a little bit more coffee in the morning, and if you've got to temper it with scotch later on in the evening, whatever, but it cleared off. Mother Nature adjusts her schedule, that the days are very long where we farm and we ranch, and, you know, the plants made it up. I mean, it dried up a bit, that we were concerned about things, you know, through certain areas, and yet the yields that we're doing with, you know, both cereals and oilseeds are, you know, I've always said to, you know, your group or the Shaughnessy that, you know, you might be able to buy a boat, you know. It might be a canoe, might be, yeah, you didn't say what kind of boat, you just said a boat. Yeah, it's true, but either way, we're very We're in a good spot, let's just say that. Okay, yeah, now that is not the norm for a lot of your province, so you're doing well, but your time has been before, Tim, I'll be honest. You don't always get a good year. Yeah, it is, and when I say not good, I mean, you know, the water that we dealt with in some of the low spots, it's, you know, we're more familiar with that here too, Lyndsey, and we just are. I mean, you know, not that we haven't pulled out a combine out of the, you know, out of the mud, then and we're very careful where the trucks are rolling right now. It's just, it's always been part of our, I won't say challenges, it's just part of stuff we have to manage. Mm-hmm. Saying that, I mean, we've combined in snow and we've fired up dryers in August and shut them off in November and again, been there, done that, but we've got a bit more age than some people and we're just wishing everybody else out there that's challenged with these weather conditions and the field conditions, You know, and the frost that was earlier and the frost that's coming, you know, just bloody well be safe. Yeah, absolutely be safe, you know. Yep, yep. Things might take a little longer, but we're gonna get them done. Uh, now, do you still have cows? Yeah, we do. We have a smaller herd. Um, I've, I've taken leave of, of ranch operations, you know, and our niece and her husband I've taken over ranch headquarters and, and, you know, the herd's smaller, but it's still, we're still part of, they're still part of Election Brothers Farms. Yeah. By all means. Okay. And how are the fields looking? They are good. Yeah. Yeah. But how's the herd? And not only that, I mean, you know, the grass was good, you know, it really was slow start, same thing. You know, guys that are, that are moving grassers this week, you know, you know, guys that we know and, you know, are, are pocketing some money, you know, they, they had some challenges through the year of, of, uh, you know, more of a foot rot issue and things like that. Yeah. Pink eye and, you know, and, but the movement of animals was less pronounced. There's feed, you know, there's feed from hell to high water, you know, around. Doesn't matter where you travel. I won't say it's, you know, I won't say it's the best quality in times. A lot of stuff has got, you know, weather with rain and things like that. And yet, you know, it's healthy, you know, so you have to pick and choose and you got to understand that you'll supplement that and do your feed tests and And, you know, don't be, don't be bragging about some bales because they don't look good, but, you know, the next field looks okay. So, I mean, there's feed out there. Yeah. So there's, you know, less trucks and diesel and lots of straw too, you know, I mean, for people that need it and in operations and, you know, we offer, we've always offered lots of fields of straw to, you know, to individuals that need it on cattle operations, not just for our own. I mean, if you need it, you know, we'll drop it for you, you know, I mean, if we can. Yeah, you make an important point though about, well, not just feed testing, but abundant hay doesn't always mean abundant hay of a certain quality, right? So it's that balance of sometimes the extra bales per acre are not a gift. It means that maybe you waited or you didn't get into the field in time because of the weather. Uh, and yeah, so feed tests can be well worth their, uh, well worth the cost. Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's an investment and nobody should ever not do that. It's— and you know yourself, I mean, not to, you know, there's lots of private companies that help you out that way. You know, there's lots, you know, from the co-ops to the, you know, public BCRC and what you can find out for support and stuff like that too. And just get it done and, you know, and it'll put money in your pocket. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. So yeah, yeah, now with all of that, I mean, you know, we're looking at, you know, we finished our cereals, barley was fantastic, you know, so there was lots of that barley that's very heavy that's heading out to feedlots when you still talk about the cattle operations. Prices are, you know, are average, you know, they're not fantastic, I mean, you know, and, you know, but that's really moving very well too, Lyndsey, you know, the feedlots, there's a demand and so we're happy with that and that helps us not only from here, you know, far away from, you know, the less rich part of the world, but, you know, even for bin space and things like that too, that they were very current on hauls. Yeah, so, and that is one of the nice things, I think, when we, when we look at these, you know, the sustained good times in the cattle industry. That's just it, it starts to pick up, it stretches out further, right, what the benefits are. So things like, you know, that strong demand, you know, in the feedlots, those sorts of things really helps too. Before I let you go, Because we're running out of time here, Tim. But the question I'm asking everybody this week, and I have a feeling you'll have a good one. I'm asking everyone if they could get rid of a certain red tape hurdle or something that's holding them back as far as like a rule or regulation or extra admin that really trips you up, what would you get rid of? Oh man, where do I start? You only give me a second to do that. I mean, you know, really Harmonisation in, in, in, in even licensing for these truckers that are coming in, you know, of times and e-logs and stuff like that, that are, that's really, and that's just current because I'm saying through harvest, you know, I mean, you know, guys that are rolling in and they've got, you know, 2 hours left and, you know, they've got a night over and, you know, before they can, you know, even load or, or move stuff around. And that's a simple one, Lyndsey. Yeah. It just is. I mean, you start talking other harmonisation of anything, I mean, God, the politics of the redundancy of cool raising its head and things like that. Yeah. We know that those kind of things are so costly for managing of animals and stuff like that and logistics that just ends up down to Down to consumers, you know. So I mean, it's— I mean, we can go on and on and on, but— We could, but we only have so much time. But really, so when I— when with this question, I'm always surprised what people answer, but I had sort of in my head a few things that I thought would come up, and I suspected that something like the transport side would come up. So I'm not that far removed, I guess, from the reality of things. It's a big deal. I mean, and, you know, I mean, yeah, no, I mean, we're very fortunate, Lyndsey, of having a number of individuals and families that come and spend time with us on our operation. And, you know, and I mean professional families, you know, a personal friend that's a dentist and her husband's a, you know, physiotherapist, and their girls have spent lots of time out there and they understand what we do here. And they You know, they're focused even as they're growing up of helping support what we're doing and are flabbergasted by the food guide even, you know, some of the challenges that are happening of decision makers there. And it's like, what, you know, who's doing that? You know, I mean, you know, just so those things are important too. They just are. They are. And I, for one, I actually really appreciate when you have people from outside farming and agriculture come And like think about things and talk through things and point out some of the things that they notice and see. It's always a real learning experience all around, which I think is really great. Okay, Tim, we have to leave it there. Just to add, they become champions for us. They absolutely become our champions. I mean, you know, people are tired of seeing this old cowboy show up in Ottawa or Regina or wherever, you know, or, you know, when we were doing things. They don't need somebody with a hat and a white moustache. They need somebody that's a young professional that trusts what you're doing, what you're involved, you know, on your own farm, you know, out in Ontario and your professional side of what we're doing right now, they want to explain what's happening with that and people will trust what they say as much as what we say. I still like the hat and moustache though, Tim, so we'll leave it there. Okay, good luck with the rest of harvest. Thank you so much for making time for me today. I really appreciate it. Take care. You bet, anytime. All right, big thank you to Tim. Of course, big fan of RealAg. We've known him a long time and it's always wonderful to catch up. I haven't talked to him in so long. Okay, let's take a quick break here on the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds, and next up we're going to head to Manitoba. Get ahead for next season and get rewarded for planning early. Buy and take home Vantage Ag products by October 12th and save 10% off current suggested retail pricing. Then buy with confidence with our best price protection programme. If prices drop later, we'll rebate the difference, guaranteeing you this year's best price. With nutrients delivered directly to the plant, Vantage Ag helps you use less, pay less, and get better results. Lock in your savings by October 12th at vantage.ag. Hi, I'm Bern Tobin, host of the Soybean School on RealAgriculture.com. Throughout the year, On the Soybean School, we'll bring you timely agronomic video content from planting to harvest, from the latest agronomic research to the latest in production technology. Check out our massive video library on YouTube, RealAgriculture.com, or download the audio podcast versions wherever you get your podcasts. The Soybean School is brought to you by Maizex Seeds and Lallemand Plant Care. Get all the information you need to keep your pulse crop healthy and profitable with the Pulse The Pulse School on RealAgriculture.com. The Pulse School is a free YouTube video series covering agronomy, research, and more across a host of different pulse crops. It's also available as an audio podcast wherever you download or stream your favourite podcasts. Check us out on YouTube or visit RealAgriculture.com. The Pulse School, brought to you by BASF Canada. Welcome back to RealAg Radio here on Rural Radio Channel 143 SiriusXM. Today's show brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds, celebrating 100 years of helping growers maximise yield potential. Contact your local Pioneer sales rep or visit pioneer.com/canada to learn more. And as promised, we're going to hop to my home province of Manitoba. I've got Aubrey Yule from Killarney, Manitoba, All right, we head now to near Killarney, Manitoba. I've got Aubrey Yule on the line. Aubrey, how you doing? Oh, not bad. How about you, Lyndsey? Well, I'm doing okay. I'm dealing with too dry of weather and I feel like you're not. So what has the weather turned around for you is, I guess, the question. Well, today is the first day that the crop tested under 10, and I kind of lost track, so we're going hard right now, and I missed your call just now because I actually picked up a stone with the combine and it kicked off, so I'm just kind of in between right now. Sorry, I take no responsibility for such things, but never a good sound when such things happen. No, okay, so you're Back combining then, so are you having what we've been hearing as far as, you know, this harvest season that just can't seem to get rolling? Yeah, it's ours, so we're not as wet as sounds like further west of us, it's pretty wet and north of me, but east seems okay is what I've heard. Yeah, but yeah, so we're We're at 60% completed basically. Yeah, so that's actually not bad compared to some, that's for sure. I'm always amazed though, like when conditions finally sort themselves out and everybody gets rolling, I am amazed at how much progress we can make in a short amount of time should the weather cooperate. Now what all was in the lineup this year? You mentioned your canola, but what else is in the rotation? We had oats, barley, and wheat, and we've got some soybeans after we— or at some point maybe between some of the canola. Okay, and so what is done so far? All the cereals are done and about half of the canola is done, and it's really flat. That's hence I'm picking up a stone and We threw some lifters on the other combine. I think they're helping quite a bit. Yeah, I'm trying to— I'm sticking to the flat spots and he's picking up the, the oddball spots. Yeah, so it's flat because of rain, it's flat because of maybe some standability combined with too much rain. Did you have hail? Is this just the luck of the draw? What's all going on? This year it's 3 or 4 things. We had a bad, like a 60 km/h wind A month ago roughly that flattened it, and then a bunch of rain, and I think Verticillium potentially. But yeah, like, yeah, so kind of a combination of things. Yeah. Is Verticillium like something that you've confirmed in past years and is definitely on your radar now, or is this looking worse this year than other years? I haven't looked into it too much, but I've This field, I think, is— that's what it looks like. So yeah, it's definitely going to be on our watch list for if we do canola in this field again, we'll probably try to find that resistant seed for it. Yeah, which we don't have great options yet, but as you said, the next time you come back to that field, we might have many more options. So yeah, well, also, I don't know, maybe stretch the rotation out a bit. How did the oats go? They went pretty good. We haven't grown them in 20 years, so it was kind of a learning curve, but they yielded pretty good, and I sold them locally, so don't have to truck them far. So yeah, they were a lot of fun because, yeah, as a trucker, I kept quite busy. Yes, they're very fluffy though, so they make you feel good, but there's not always necessarily a lot there. Yeah, they are, but also, okay, you point out though that you sold locally, I would think right now being able to ship shorter distances is definitely an advantage. Yeah, definitely, and the price for oats is, well, everything's kind of up at the moment, so the price actually went up recently, which is nice. Yeah, no kidding. Again, also, because it's so big and fluffy, storage, it takes up a lot of room, so if you can get rid of it right off the combine, that's also nice for sure. Now we are hearing on the wheat side, because wheat is one of those ones that did get caught out in some of this poor weather. What's the quality like on the wheat that you're done? We got lucky and had good weather for most of our wheat. The last couple hundred acres got a bit extra rain, so we sent them away, sent a sample away for a falling number. Yep, is what they were concerned about, so hopefully they're okay too, but I haven't— we haven't heard back yet. Okay, it seems to be— I feel like this is like the new— this will be like the harvest drinking game is falling. Every time someone says falling number, you take a drink because it definitely— I mean, it makes sense, right? In that— It's not going to end well. I did say maybe you take a shot of coffee. I don't know, you'll be wired in no time. But it definitely seems to be the most mentioned right now. And that, of course, I mean, I get it. It's a measure of weathering or sprouting or those sorts of things. So totally get it and wait and see what happens, I guess, when that comes back. Okay, and then canola, you said it's flat yield-wise. Are you pleasantly surprised? Are you disappointed? Or is it landing at kind of where you thought? Pretty underwhelming. The wind shook a lot of pods and seeds off So I think it would have been a really good crop, but that's, you know, that's how it goes sometimes. So yeah, it's, yeah, it's still, yeah, it'll be okay, but it's not, no bumper crop. Yeah, now, and you said oats were new in 20 years. Is soybeans a typical part of your rotation, and, or where does that fit in? Yes, we've been doing them the last 4 years and they're pretty good for the most part. They're easy to grow compared to canola, they kind of take care of themselves a bit better usually and you don't have to babysit them quite as much, so that's always nice. Yeah, that is true. I'm not a big fan of soybeans but it is true they are kind of, at least in some areas, pretty low maintenance and when you're used to canola that is an advantage. That is for sure. Okay, my question this week is, and you can take a minute if you need, but I'm asking everybody on, let's say, red tape, extra administration, silly rules and regulations, if you could get rid of one particular red tape hurdle, what would it be? That is a good question. Red tape hurdles. I can't even think of them at the moment. Carbon tax always seemed like a silly one, but I believe they're— are they kiboshing that? Is that still? Yeah, I think we're still at the point where we, yeah, for the most part have managed to avoid that one. Who knows if it's actually permanent? We'll have to look into that one. That's for sure. Yeah, what'll be funny is after we end our call, you'll probably think of like 10 of them, and so feel free to send them along if you do. There was one that I don't think it ever went through, but they were talking about not letting people use dicamba, and we rely pretty heavily on dicamba, so I hope they don't go through with that. Okay, so yeah, that was the— so in the States, they actually did Stop the over-the-top dicamba. So in season, they did not allow it in season. So you could use that early, but yeah, but not in season. And yeah, definitely a huge difference if it's one that you rely on. What are you targeting when you're using dicamba? Usually Kochia. That's a nasty weed on our farm. It germinates all year round basically, and it'll break off at the stem and it's a tumbleweed, and then I believe it has 100 and some thousand seeds per plant, so it's just evil and it's Roundup resistant. Evil is the right way to describe Kochia, Albert, you are bang on. Yeah, and the tumbleweed thing, that is like, just on Monday on The Agronomist, Tyler Gelland out of Saskatchewan, he posted pictures of like an aerial shot of a field and it's just lines Where you can just see where the tumbleweed just like made itself a trail and it just leaves all its babies behind. It is evil. It is rude. Okay, Albert, we've got to leave it there. Sorry about the rock. Hope it all comes out okay and it didn't break anything. Don't worry. Can I do a shameless plug quick? Of course. Yes, you may. Okay, anybody listening, check out Family Farm Fix on Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok. Subscribe! Subscribe, everybody. Okay, awesome. Thank you so much. Have a great day. Thanks, Peter. We are going to take a quick break here from the Farmer Rapid Fire right here on RealAg Radio, brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds. We're going to head to Colorado next. If you're involved in the agriculture industry, it's important to stay informed on all the latest issues affecting your business at RealAgriculture.com. We offer fast, reliable news, information, and insights to help you keep on top of all of the latest in Canadian agriculture. Visit RealAgriculture.com and sign up for our free daily newsletter covering everything from news, agronomy, animal agriculture, and much more. Visit RealAgriculture.com/subscribe today. Your operation is changing and your irrigation technology should do more than keep up. Trade in and trade up to AgSense from Valley Irrigation. With AgSense 365, your irrigation is more than something you monitor, it's something you can stay ahead of. More insight, more control, more confidence in every decision. And whether you're already with AgSense or running another Pivot brand, now's the time to check out your upgrade opportunity. Trade in, trade up, and move forward. Talk to your Valley dealer or visit valleyirrigation.com/tradein today. Welcome back to RealAg Radio here on Rural Radio, Channel 143 SiriusXM. It is the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds. We head now to— well, we're going to Colorado. I've got Mark Arnusch on the line. Mark, how are you? Just fine, how are you today? I'm doing well. We don't, we don't get a lot of American farmers on the Farmer Rapid Fire, so this is super exciting for me. Yeah, absolutely, happy to visit with you. Okay, so tell us what's keeping you busy this week. Right now we're trying to get our fall-seeded cereal crop in the ground. It's been awful dry here in eastern Colorado. I farm about 35 miles northeast of Denver in a very arid area. We're mostly irrigated, but our water supplies have run short this year, and so we're trying to get a little bit of our winter wheat planted right now, and certainly our triticale for the dairy sector in the Okay, now is this about on time? Are you a little behind? Where would you say you're at as far as trying to get the fall crop in? I would say we're just a touch behind normal. We try to get our wheat seed in the ground usually around the 20th or so of September. It's been so dry we've delayed plantings a little bit, but at some point the drills have got to go to the field, and, and so here we are. Yeah, that's— I mean, the The goal here is that, or the idea is it will eventually rain, it's just how long we'll have to wait, right? Now, is that the kind of season you've had or has it just turned really dry? We've had an incredibly dry season. We really didn't have any kind of winter at all. Last year's fall-seeded winter crop got off to a great start. We had great moisture in October last year, had great stand establishment, but we actually did not have a killing frost or a freeze in our area area until December, which is super unusual for us. Yeah. And then we didn't have any snow cover through the winter. And as you can imagine, being in an irrigated area that depends upon snowfall, our water resources ran out at the end of April. So we left about 75% of our farm unplanted this year. Uh, no corn on my farm for the first time in my farming career. And it's been tough. We've had less than 4 inches of rainfall on our farm for the entire calendar year. Wow. Now, so this is one of those differences, I think, between Canada and the US. Do you have coverage for like, you're not planting, there is no moisture, does that mean that there's like a programme out there to say, okay, we'll at least keep you afloat for the year? How does that work? So we do have a programme. It's administered through our RMA, or Risk Management Association, for crop insurance. Yep. And so we have preventative plant coverage, which essentially gives you about 55% of your normal coverage. So if you insure to say the 75% level on the multi-peril or We're getting 55% of that coverage, but it has to meet a certain test. For us, drought is certainly our biggest driver, but the lack of available irrigation water is our peril, our loss. And so we have to document that. We have to show that we had intentions to plant the crop, like fertility down, field work down, seed purchase, things like that. Yep. But it does provide us a safety net that at least buys us time until we can start producing a crop again. And so hopeful of this fall-seeded crop that's going in the ground, what potentially does an El Niño mean for your area if you had such a mild winter last year, such a dry year? Does this mean you may end up— if with this super El Niño that's setting up, does that bring more water to your area, or does that actually threaten to extend this drought? We're right on the dividing line. If you can look at a map and show kind of, you know, where there's supposed to be more moisture and less moisture, we're right on that dividing line. But our mountains, most of our snowpack comes out of the Rocky Mountains outside of Denver. They're supposed to have a well-above-normal precipitation flow here through, through the winter months and into spring. So I tell you all that to basically tell you our prospects for irrigation water look better for next year potentially with the super El Niño. It remains to be seen what we'll see here on the Eastern Plains. Okay, so it could go very well, it could be perfect, you might be in the Goldilocks zone, or maybe not. So okay, that's interesting where you land though. So we're always optimists, we're always hopeful for better moisture, we're trying to plan around it as best we can, and we've got our fingers crossed. And right now that's all we can do regarding weather. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, now you mentioned corn typically, but what is your typical rotation? So we do a lot of different things within our farm. We grow some seed wheat, we grow a lot of seed barley, Grains for the craft beer and spirits industry, and then we'll round out those acres with triticale silage corn for our dairy sector and quite a bit of alfalfa. We're typically a corn-wheat rotation on some of our irrigation acres. We have our alfalfa acres going through a rotation, but we have the flexibility because of where we're at to really respond to market signals. to water availability, meaning that we can match the crop to the water that we have available, and then we really like to rotate barley through in our acres because it helps us break up some of the disease pressure that we have, especially with our corn acres. Yeah, for sure. That is a— Mark, you might win for like neatest rotation I think I've ever documented on this show. It's not usually the mix we get. I mean, you didn't say beans in there anywhere, and to have— we got some malt barley in Western Canada, don't get me wrong, but that's pretty cool to have that in the lineup with alfalfa. That's the one you don't hear a lot of in a general rotation with crops, so super cool. Okay, before we run out of time, my question this week, and being our American guest this week, I've asked the farmers, and so I'll ask you the same, if you could do away with one red tape hurdle, one administrative sort of thing that really really irritates you, what would it be? Our state's overreach into production agriculture. Here in Colorado, we have a lot of overreach with our Department of Agriculture trying to ban a lot of the tools that we have in the toolbox, like neonicotinoid insecticides. We were able to defeat some legislation this last year that takes that tool away from the, the grower, and it looks like it's coming back. And so we have a lot of overreach that even goes above and beyond our EPA in the United States trying to overregulate a lot of our crop protection products, many of the herbicides, insecticides that we use in the state, how we apply fertiliser, and they're trying to codify numeric values into our state's constitution. So they're going to try to prescriptively legislate agriculture, and they're too far away removed from the farm to really be able to make what are good, are considered good decisions on the land. I think we need to leave it up to the experts, the agronomists, the farmers, to really be the boots on the field. Yeah, I'm with you on that one. Anytime they try to get prescriptive, I think they forget we're working with biological systems here. I don't know that biology doesn't really care what we think, to be honest. So there you go. Okay, Mark, we've got to leave it there. Thank you so much for this. I really appreciate your time. Thanks. You bet. Thanks for having me on. All right, and we'll be back with more of the Farmer Rapid Fire right here on RealAg Radio right after this. Built on over 100 years of seed innovation and unwavering commitment to farmers, Pioneer 100 Series canola hybrids deliver a step change in yield performance and agronomic traits. This isn't just better canola, it's different canola. Pioneer 100 Series. Contact your local Pioneer sales representative or visit pioneer.com/100series to learn more today. I'm Lyndsey Smith, host of The Agronomist, and I want to thank you for tuning in for over 200 episodes of our beloved little programme. Join me Monday nights, 8:00 PM Eastern on YouTube Welcome back to RealAg Radio here on RealAg TV. Join us each Monday night at 7 PM Eastern time for our live and interactive agronomy Q&A. Each week, our guest panel will handle some of your toughest agronomic questions live streaming on YouTube, Facebook, X, and RealAgriculture.com. Tune in Monday nights or go to RealAgriculture.com/agronomist and sign up for our email notifications and don't miss an episode. Welcome back to RealAg Radio here on Welcome back to RealAg Radio, Channel 143 SiriusXM. It is Thursday, it is the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Brand Seeds, and every week on this show we stop off at 4 different farms and then we sit down with a different agronomist every week. And now here's my conversation with Holly Lucas based in Ontario. Joining me now, I've got Holly Lucas. She's with Pioneer Brand Seeds here in Ontario, based Several hours from me though, Holly, so a different world really, entirely based near Brantford, Ontario. Holly, how has your week been? My week's been great, the weather has been decent so far, nice and moderate, a little bit of sun. Okay, and we'll take it. What are you seeing out there though? This is— we are in this interesting, you know, harvest is rolling but maybe not quite ready, trying to sort of be patient, sit on our hands a little bit. What are you seeing out there as far as the corn crop? So a couple things. I feel like number one that I just noticed yesterday was how quickly tar spot has moved in kind of north of me where it wasn't there a week or two ago. And it's not moved in south of Brantford. So I do expect probably in the next couple weeks it's going to ramp up down there. But that's been interesting to see how quickly it came in. And then the other thing I think we're looking at is some stalk and crown rot in the crop that we don't normally see or haven't seen as bad in previous years. Okay, so a few things to unpack on that one. It does seem like tar spot, I mean, it's a hot topic. We're worried about it. We had a bad year last year, not so bad. I mean, this seems late though, Holly, like, do we need to worry about A yield impact, or is this more like a heads up for next year kind of discussion? Correct. It's more of a, in my opinion, a heads up for next year. Just around me, the corn's pretty much black layered. It's gonna black layer if it hasn't already. It'll be in the next week or so. So yeah, you're not going to see a huge yield impact. A couple of bushels maybe. Definitely some plant death, which affects standability. So that's your main thing, getting that crop off if it's got infection in it, and then South of me, we had a lot of corn that went in in the first week or so of June, so that would be where if it does come in there, we might see a bit of a yield impact. We're still about 2 weeks away from black layer with that crop. Right, so, but this late in the season, for the most part, it's— we need to watch inoculant building, that inoculum build more so than the yield on this year's corn. But you did mention, and we talked about this on Monday's show as well, some premature death or seeing some dying corn plants and that the culprit may be crown rot, which is not necessarily super common. What are you seeing on that? What should farmers be looking for? Yeah, so I would add in it could be stalk rot as well. So either stalk or crown will cause that, that top plant of the plant to die. So yeah, just be out in your fields. I mean, like you said, we're not harvesting yet anyway, so you got some time. So you can do the push test on your corn stalks where you push them. I like to just push them over to the next row. If they snap, you can slice open the stem and take a look for some stalk rots. The other thing for crown rot would be something an agronomist taught me years ago is you can kick the bottom of the plant. So you basically just run your foot right across the soil surface and right into that plant, and if it snaps right at the base, that's crown rot. We have been seeing some early crown rot, so if it doesn't snap but it feels kind of soft, maybe just take your knife and dig her in right at the soil surface. But crown rot is right at that surface level. Okay, and any suspicions on why this year? I would take a look at the weather forecasts that we've had. We have a lot of rain, a lot of heavy rains over the year, over the season, so Depending on which stalk rot it is, they come in at different times and with warm saturated soils versus cool saturated soils. So we've just had good conditions for fungal diseases. Yeah, okay, and that does mean, so you mentioned the push test, stalk rots, crown rots, anything with that stalk integrity. How important will it be then though if a producer notices something like this in their field on getting that corn out of the field as soon as possible? Yeah, as with anything stalk or crown related, if it weakens that tissue, then the plants are more likely to go down. So the sooner you can get it harvested, then the less chance you have of having a mess and having to go in there and harvest downed corn. That's never fun. It is not fun at all. Now, you've also got, and this is really cool and so interested to hear about this, in that it does feel like we've had sort of an interesting year here in Ontario. I felt like we were by end of June like way ahead as far as like, you know, growing degree units. And but then now here we are, you know, end of September, early October, are we ahead? Are we behind? Are we on average? Like, where are we at as far as the kind of season we've had? Yeah, so it's been interesting. We have an internal tool that we can track TDUs on, so I've been watching them all season every week. And it's been neat to see. May, we were behind, especially the first couple weeks of May. And then we kind of started getting warmer towards the end of May. And then June, we really got warm. Like June planted corn just came flying out of the ground, which is not always the case. So we kind of caught up like you said, right? June was warm and we felt like we were ahead, but we actually just kind of caught up to our 5-year average. And then we've just been Kind of trucking along at our 5-year average all season, which, you know, a lot of growers have asked me over the last few weeks, you know, it feels like we're behind. But when you, when you have the tool to be able to track it, yeah, we're just sitting on our 5-year average. You know, we've been bumping around between 3%, 5% above kind of all year. So it's October 1st when this is going to air. So, you know, that's kind of what I expect for our area. Yeah, I mean, I'm glad to hear that we have some tools to measure this and that we sort of sit around that average because it is interesting how our sense of things could kind of skew things. So it's nice to have that hard data that actually says, hey, this is about average, and so there we are. All right, Holly, we're going to leave it there. Thank you so much for joining me here on the Farmer Rapid Fire. I really appreciate it. Thanks for having me. Well, that does it for today's show. Thank you so much for joining us here. If you've got feedback, you can drop us a text or call 1-855-776-6147. I'm not sure why I keep tripping up on this. I never have before, but there you go. Also, I love the Farmer Rapid Fire. It's one of our favourite shows from our audience as well. If you know someone who you think would be a great addition, zip me an email, lsmith@realagriculture.com. We're always looking for new names, new locations, new places new people we can visit with on the Farmer Rapid Fire, so send it along. I'll be back tomorrow for the Friday Issues panel. I have Tyler McCann and Kelvin Heppner joining me. Until then, cheers everybody. Cheers.