Better Farming publishes nine editions of its Prairies magazine each year. 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 Geoff Geddes
Though there’s often a fine line between right and wrong, some distinctions are clear:
Recycling: Good.
Dumping your household trash in a farmer’s ditch: Bad.
Strolling through the park: Nice.
Stomping over someone’s crops: Not so much.
by Jackie Clark
For many industrial or manufacturing jobs, standard operating procedures (SOPs) are a valuable tool used to promote safety, efficiency and consistency, and to comply with standards or legislation. In agriculture, SOPs can be used to realize those same outcomes.
By Taryn Milton
Farmers in some areas of Western Canada experienced dry conditions in 2020, and in the spring of 2021, the southern parts of both Manitoba and Saskatchewan were very dry.
By Jackie Clark
Sage Watson is a fierce competitor on the track.
Insects are a pest that crop farmers deal with every year. And while pest varieties can change from year to year depending on a number of factors, the Prairies have some pests that farmers are almost always certain to deal with. Better Farming connects with some industry experts about the most common pests on the Prairies, how they affect crops and how they can be controlled.
by Taryn Milton
Sprayers are an important piece of equipment in a farmer’s lineup of machinery. But they were not always considered as essential as they are now.
by Taryn Milton
Women have always been a part of agriculture.
In a general sense and in the traditional role of farm wife, they worked hard to keep operations moving through the years.
Today, women are no longer solely wives of farmers. They are agronomists, veterinarians, presidents of ag companies and farmers themselves.
by Taryn Milton
One of the top items on a producer’s to-do list this planting season may be to review which weeds they need to battle this year.
Depending on the province and soil zone you’re in, the weeds that you’ll encounter this year can vary. An effective way to get a jump on managing your weed situation is to assess, plan, implement and evaluate, says Rory Cranston.
by Taryn Milton
As growers in Western Canada prepare for the upcoming planting season, it’s time to start thinking about what pests you might be dealing with this year.
From cutworms to flea beetles, grasshoppers to wheat stem sawfly, growers in Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Alberta saw a variety of pests in 2020 that can cause problems for this upcoming year.
By Taryn Milton
Western Canada is celebrated as the breadbasket of Canada, with more than 70 per cent of the country’s farmland within Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan.
But who really owns most of this land? And how is this changing?
In November, the Manitoba office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives (CCPA) published a report titled Concentration Matters: Farmland Inequality on the Prairies.