Better Farming will publish nine editions of its Prairies magazine in 2020. After publishing each edition, we share a feature article online. Each Better Farming Prairies magazine includes much more content – you won’t want to miss it. If you don’t receive the print edition of Better Farming Prairies, but you enjoy reading the articles below, be sure to subscribe to the magazine!
by Taryn Milton
The 2020 crop year taught us many lessons about canola and wheat. While we anticipated some challenges, like the continued rise in clubroot and fusarium pressure, other hurdles, like the surge in wireworm pressure, were unexpected.
by Taryn Milton
Keith Fournier, a third-generation Saskatchewan grain farmer, sees sustainable agriculture as a three-legged stool.
The first leg is the widely discussed environmental sustainability, the second one is economic sustainability and the third element is social-equity sustainability, he says.
by Taryn Milton
Perhaps paradoxically, we can think of the plant microbiome – or the microbial community in and around the plant – as both an old and a recent field of study.
by Taryn Milton
When Dan and Carol Ohler started farming with Dan’s parents, Neil and Elizabeth Ohler, the younger couple didn’t foresee the twisted – although ultimately positive – journey the experience would lead them on.
by Geoff Geddes
Like life itself, farming is about addressing the hard questions: How do I combat the latest crop pest? Which farming practices are most beneficial? How did Mother Nature get such a warped sense of humour?
by Geoff Geddes
For city dwellers, the greatest threat from insects could be a bed bug infestation or a mosquito bite. But when farming is your livelihood, insects and plant diseases can bite into your bottom line in a hurry.
by Geoff Geddes
Though grain and oilseed farmers are often do-it-yourself types, they sometimes need a helping hand to get a leg up to succeed in business. The person who knows more about spraying the fields or playing the commodity markets can be a powerful ally.
by John Loeppky
As we know, Canada’s farm population accounts for a small minority (less than 2 per cent) of the country’s total population, according to 2016 Statistics Canada data. And one subset of this workforce that is underrepresented is individuals with disabilities.
by Geoff Geddes
The relationship between Canada’s railways and the grain sector, like any other relationship, has featured strong teamwork, periodic spats and nights when they both went to bed mad.
Dale Hofstra, a dairy farmer from Millet, Alta., had trouble gaining access to reliable high-speed Internet service until the summer of 2019. He couldn’t stream Netflix, let alone fully use all the technology necessary to efficiently run his operation.