The Agri Post
September 27, 2013
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
Government Adds Funds to Dairy Research and Innovation Canadian dairy farmers will benefit from increased funding in research and innovation with the support of the federal government. An additional fund of $12 million will bring together scientific expertise for research in key areas such as sustainable milk production, dairy genetics and genomics, and the nutrition of milk products. This research will help increase the competitiveness of the sector by improving productivity and animal health and welfare. The research will also help bring innovative and competitive dairy products with health benefits to the market. “Research continues to be a strategic investment priority for dairy farmers,” said Wally Smith, President of Dairy Farmers of Canada. “Our research priorities are focused on driving innovation and increased productivity on the farm while contributing to the health and well-being of Canadians. We welcome the investment of the federal government, which leverages farmers’ investment in the dairy cluster, our network of dedicated industry and academic researchers who are committed to Canadian dairy excellence.” Dairy Farmers of Canada is working closely with the Canadian Dairy Network and the Canadian Dairy Commission to invest over $6 million in addition to the Harper Government’s funding to support cutting edge research to strengthen this key sector. The research cluster will support what industry has identified as the highest priority research, done by the best Canadian experts in research centres across the country. Agriculture Canada researchers will collaborate on several priorities, including research that leads to genetic improvement for dairy cattle productivity and profitability, establishing innovative practices for sustainable milk production, and gaining a better understanding of the link between dairy foods and nutrition. Canada is leading the way in dairy genetics and the results of research have helped to significantly improve milk production per cow over the last 30 years. This has helped to open markets in the Middle East, Pacific Rim and South America, with exports of over $110 million in dairy genetics last year. The research will build on an earlier funding of $7 million made through Growing Forward for a dairy cluster that focused on the health benefits of dairy products and ways to improve animal productivity through health and breeding. Previous research found new practices to help improve the health of dairy cattle and the safety and quality of milk by better understanding how to prevent infections caused by mastitis, an inflammation of the mammary gland and udder tissue that impacts milk production and is costly to the sector.
The Agri Post
September 27, 2013
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Government Halts Cattle Levy By Harry Siemens Something finally happened that seemed much overdue, the scrapping of the Manitoba Cattle Enhancement Council (MCEC) Levy. After MCEC’s recommendation, the Farm Products Marketing Council stopped collecting the voluntary cattle enhancement levy effective September 1 supported by the by the province of Manitoba, said Agriculture, Food and Rural Initiatives Minister Ron Kostyshyn. Kostyshyn said the MCEC and Manitoba’s livestock producers showed their dedication to the future of the industry and believes Manitoba needs federally inspected cattle slaughter capacity. “Since the federal government made the decision to withdraw their $10 million pledge, everyone did their best to increase federal cattle slaughter capacity in Manitoba,” said Minister Kostyshyn. “As a cattle producer, I believe it is now time to end the levy before the fall cattle run. We hope the federal government will come back to the table if a new opportunity arises.” Established in the wake of the BSE crisis, the MCEC worked hard with the industry to increase Manitoba’s cattle slaughter capacity. However, to no avail, the majority of the cattle producers did not want the $2 voluntary levy to continue. The provincial government added that cattle levies and provincial funds provided loans to assist the expansion of provincial slaughter facilities, purchase and preparation of the Marion Street project site, and development of a new model for cattle slaughter. “MCEC spent $5.7 million developing the Marion Street project based on the commitment that they were going to receive financing through the Federal Slaughter Improvement Program,” said Kostyshyn. “We must now turn our attention to supporting the industry through other ways, such as strong opposition to COOL (country of origin labelling), working on insurance-based products for producers,
maintaining community pastures and investing in research that will increase the resiliency and profitability of Manitoba’s livestock sector.” An independent, third party will work with MCEC to develop a plan to wind down the organization. The levy was voluntary and producers will maintain the right to request a rebate for levies paid over the past 12 months. The province will work with MCEC to ensure that resources are in place to deliver refunds in a timely manner. One producer said that, while never favouring the concept, he thought that maybe sometime it would actually help him in the form of some additional slaughter capacity so he left his money in the council. Now he will apply for a refund of the last 12 months the government deducted from the sale of his cattle. Manitoba Beef Producers (MBP) supports this decision. “Manitoba’s beef producers have called for this decision through resolutions at our district meetings and annual general meetings and MBP has made this request known to the provincial government,” said Trevor Atchison, MBP president. “It is time to close this chapter in Manitoba’s beef sector and move forward on key priority issues.” The MBP likes the idea of the provincial government’s clearly stated commitment to other initiatives that will benefit Manitoba’s beef producers, including maintaining community pastures, working on trade issues like country of origin labelling (COOL), developing of insurance-based products aimed at the beef sector, and investing in research. These are key priorities for our members. Atchison said MBP continues to support the expansion of federally inspected slaughter capacity in Manitoba provided there is a viable business plan. Manitoba Beef Producers looks forward to a transparent and orderly wind down of the MCEC and a swift and clear indication of how producer monies remaining with that organization will be handled. According to the Progressive Conservative, party in
Manitoba for years, the NDP charged cattle producers $2 per head, promising that there would be a Manitoba-based, federally inspected processing plant in St. Boniface. The program collected $8 million from producers, but it appears the government wasted $6.8 million dollars with nothing to show for the producers’ efforts. “The NDP’s Agriculture Minister should be ashamed of himself for getting so little return on the investment made by Manitoba’s cattle producers,” said agricultural critic Ralph Eichler. “It truly is an embarrassment to have $6.8 million of producers’ hard-earned money wasted in this fashion. I don’t know how Minister Kostyshyn could look a fellow cattle producer in the eye and say he did his best for them.” According to Kostyshyn, another big loss is the failure to deliver on the pledge to grant $920,000 to Plains Processors through the MCEC. In announcing the plan to stop collecting the levy, the NDP government blamed the federal government for the failure to build the promised plant. However, the federal government was clear that they were pulling out because they did not believe the plan was viable.
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
Predictions In Romania, fortunetellers can be fined for making predictions that don’t come true. If their record is poor, enough they can even go to jail. On his Freakonomics podcast, economist Stephen Dubner calls this a “revolutionary” idea. Why? Because we typically don’t hold anyone accountable for bad predictions. Why just fortunetellers, he asks? Why not politicians, money managers and sports pundits? While we’re at it, let’s add in weather forecasters as well. Dubner and his co-host Steven Levitt look at the world through an economist’s lens. As they have observed, we have all sorts of “incentives set up encouraging predictions.” On the flip side, there’s almost no disincentive to getting a prediction wrong. Therefore, it should come as no surprise that we have a growing demand for predictions. Research psychologist Philip Tetlock agrees. He believes that we are “hard-wired” to think that we “live in a fundamentally predictable and controllable universe.” Because of this, “there is an enormous demand for accurate predictions in many spheres of life in which we don’t have the requisite expertise to deliver. And when you have that kind of gap between demand and real supply you get the infusion of fake supply.” Because we now get more upset when something surprises us than we did in the past. Some academics argue that our desire for predictability is getting worse. As more and more of the world falls into regular routines, where people know what to expect from day to day, the more troubled we are in when something out of the ordinary happens. One of the things Tetlock’s research looked at was how often the “experts” were actually right. Unsurprisingly, it’s not often. When it comes to political forecasts, he looked at 80,000 predictions by 300 experts over 20 years. In general he found that they “thought they knew more than they knew”, or put another way, were “systematically overconfident”. Did they beat a monkey with a dartboard, asks Stephen Dubner? Yes, but just barely. They did about as well as the average daily reader of the New York Times. What about the experts on Wall Street? Christina Fang, a professor of management at New York University’s business school, has been looking at their track record. What she found is that “people who make big, bold, correct
Penners Points by Rolf Penner
predictions are in general worse than average at rolfpenner@agripost.ca predicting the economic future.” Levitt explains again that this is because of incentives. “The incentives for prediction makers are to make either cataclysmic or utopian predictions. Because you don’t get any attention if I say that what’s going to happen tomorrow is exactly what’s going to happen today.” Okay, what about sports? The Freakonomics staff looked at the NFL and found that, because there are only four divisions, the untrained person had about a 25 percent chance of picking each division correctly. The experts do a little better, but not much; their success rate is around 36 percent. Next, they looked at the United States Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) crop predictions. On the surface, these seem more accurate, with monthly forecasts that tend to be correct to within five percent most of the time. Unfortunately, in the agricultural world we need them to be much more precise for this to be really useful. The real problem with the USDA’s accuracy is the weather. Weather is so hard to predict that the USDA doesn’t even use forecasts it uses historic averages. This helps to explain why, when they get things wrong, such as when there is a major drought, they get it really wrong. This is what happened last year. Some people are better at predictions than others are, but it’s hard to find them in the current environment. We could put penalties on false predictions as they do with Romanian fortunetellers, but that is a little harsh. The Freakonomics crew have a better idea. They suggest that we simply keep score more often. It’s not particularly hard to do; it’s just that no one is doing it. Imagine if every time we saw one of the talking heads on TV making a prediction we also saw their personal batting average on the screen right next to their name. Another option is prediction markets, which would be similar to futures markets, where people literally would have to put their money where their mouth is. The important thing is to realign the incentives so that those who are right are rewarded and those who are wrong pay some kind of price for their error. Until that happens, we can confidently predict… more bad predictions.
It ’s Been a Yo-Yo Season On September 16, I have no idea how cold, but I recorded with my trusty iPhone photo app the first frost on my yard. At the time of this writing, I couldn’t tell if it had damaged the flower plot in front of the house. As they say only time will tell. I don’t think it was cold enough to damage any of the later crops, and most of them were past the stage of significant damage. However, had that frost come two weeks earlier, the damage would be much more severe. Several times, I’ve recorded the yo-yo like year that we have had and most farmers could tell you about, but won’t. For the most part, they go with the flow, roll with the punches, if you like, and make the most of what they have to work with. So often people sweat over those things they have no control over, and then haven’t the energy left to do with what they have control over. Not so with most farmers. They may belly ache in the coffee shops, or restaurants, or when they get parts and dicker on new machinery, but in the end, they do the best with what they have, or even better, go with what works best for them consistently in the long run. I love going to a farm meeting where someone representing a company with a new product, how farmers sit back, indicating I’m from Missouri, show me. Rhetoric aside, when the dust settles and they see something of value, the questioning begins and for good reason. If there is something that can help a farmer do his work even better, he’s all ears and eyes. Now if the neighbour uses it first and gets good results, half will get it too, and the other half will simply wait and see. Getting back to the first frost of the year in my area, there is nothing the farmer or we can do about how cold it gets. However, the real keeners, and most of them are, will get on the phone, or drive to the nearest coffee shop or text their agronomist to determine the best course of action to take, if any.
Years ago, when my father-in-law, J.M. Froese, dad as I called him, grew buckwheat, acres and tonnes of it so to speak, even a hint of frost could end a great-looking crop overnight. If this happened when the buckwheat was almost ripe and ready to cut, the sooner he could cut it and get it on the ground the better his chances of cutting frost losses, or a poorer grade at the elevator. That is why farmers call, text, or ask what to do next should the temperature drop to freezing and beyond. Some corn and soybeans could still be a little vulnerable, but for the most part as one farmer told me on the weekend that his corn after harvesting a batch by hand, weighed 50 pounds to the bushel, not bad without a frost. The normal weight is 56 pounds per bushel. Not perfect, but certainly a marketable crop. One beef before I go. On Saturday last, travelling to a conference in Winnipeg that started at 9 am, as we’re coming out of the curve around Sperling, two men dressed in what could have been alien uniforms, stopped us, in the middle of nowhere. My first thought, hi-way robbers, but no, as one told us, “I stop cars for a hobby. There are some men down the road walking in the middle of the highway doing some work.” Ok, I said, what next. “Wait for the pilot vehicle, and he will take you safely through.” Wait, and wait…. we did. Once the pilot vehicle came with his last prey, off we went, slowly, slowly, but sure. From just east of Sperling where we waited 15 minutes at least, to Mollard, the big orange grain terminal, where two men cautiously taping stickers to the highway. Then on to Brunkild behind the faithful pilot vehicle, and yes we arrived safely. In all our attempts at government protecting us from ourselves, in some cases things have become quite stupid.
The Agri Post
How Long Will it Take? Sometimes it is just a bit awkward when people remember what you said a few years ago, especially when you’re prone to saying a lot of things. I admit that I am (on most occasions) willing to share my opinion but in most cases I don’t charge for it so I assume people don’t think it is worth much. I got a phone call last week that told me otherwise. “So how long will it take to recover from this?” asked my friend after the pleasantries of family and weather had been exchanged. “You know the prices of last year and this year’s yields with decent prices?” I feigned ignorance to his point. Usually I don’t have to pretend ignorance but this time I knew what he meant. “You used to say that 1973 was the worst year in agriculture - record yields and record prices - and it took us 20 years to recover,” he said with a smile I could hear. “What about this one, how is this going to affect us?” I acknowledged that I had indeed made those remarks on several occasions, and sometimes to large crowds. I continued to explain that this time it was different. He didn’t even pretend to believe me. “Kletke, you not fooling anyone, you know what happed in the 70s and then the interest rate went up and we’re on the same slope,” said my friend who has a few miles on him and has seen the good and the bad several times. He survived the challenges and is comfortable in his situation. I continued with my strategy of having changed my mind and donned the rose coloured glasses, “Well, there was a down-turn in the 1980s but this is different. Farmers aren’t as leveraged and they are better managers and they will not fall into the overextended trap and have to rely on the banks.” “Land and rent prices are going the same way, only with more zeros,” said my unrelenting friend. “I can’t afford to compete and I have a fair bit of equity in my farm. I am not risking it.” “Well, land prices have increased somewhat but commodity prices justify it and the expanding population will buy all the grain we can grow or else the Americans will turn their corn into fuel and we will have a false shortage that will support prices.” He asked me if I was running for office or just practising my story telling skills, (he called them something else that I can’t print here). I assured him that I saw this increase in prices as just a function of the market and it was totally justified. He told me I would not be able to say, “I told you so,” when things crashed if I didn’t call it. I told him I had no intention of saying that. With my new pink glasses, the world looked better than ever and things were coming up roses. We moved on to another topic and had a great visit.
Turning Agricultural Ideas into Action The Growing Innovation initiative is being launched under the Growing Forward 2 (GF2) federal-provincial agreement to help Manitoba producers and industry leaders turn innovative ideas into realities, Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz and Manitoba Agriculture, Food and Rural Initiatives Minister Ron Kostyshyn announced recently. “Our Government’s priority remains the economy, and strategic investments in research and innovation work to create jobs and drive economic growth,” said Ritz. “These initiatives will help Manitoba producers and processors develop new techniques and efficiencies to grow their business and keep our economy strong.” The GF2 Growing Innovation initiative will help build the expertise and capacity in Manitoba to advance innovation activities by supporting research, development and evaluation projects that are conducted on farms and in controlled environments. “Farmers and industry participants have first-hand knowledge of the challenges facing today’s agriculture, agrifood and agriproduct processes, and are the first to acknowledge the benefit of government support for the research and development of solutions,” said Kostyshyn. “Through this partnership, we can create a more competitive position for agribusinesses based on increased productivity, profitability and advanced sustainability.” The GF2 Growing Innovation initiative includes three programs, On-farm Innovation, Agrifood Research and Development Initiatives and Capacity and Knowledge Development. The Growing Innovation On-farm program provides financial support to agriculture producers and organizations for projects carried out on farms and ranches that accelerate the adoption of innovative new technologies including production practices in primary agriculture, which are from outside of province or country and may not have been adopted onfarm. The Agrifood Research and Development Initiatives program provides support for industry-led innovation projects that will advance the industry’s market competitiveness, improve productivity and manage risks proactively. The Capacity and Knowledge Development program supports the development of initiatives that expand Manitoba’s capacity for innovation, information gathering and interpretation capacity and the infrastructure used in the process of innovation. With the launch of the GF2 Growing Innovation initiative, important programs can receive support to be further developed and implemented. For example, the beef forage platform is a collaborative initiative involving producers, academics and government to target research needs to strengthen resiliency and profitability in Manitoba’s beef and forage sectors through innovation and investment, and maximize the economic, social, environmental and health benefits within their value chains. Other examples include research projects at innovation centres like Diversification Centres, Prairie Agriculture Machinery Institute and the University of Manitoba that improve crop production results or address important market sustainability issues, advancements to value-added food processing and new product development to meet consumer demand and building knowledge through soil survey mapping and the agro-meteorology information system to allow for timely decisions that reduce risks. The new five-year GF2 Agreement includes a Canada-Manitoba fund of $176 million towards strategic initiatives, a 50 per cent increase in cost-shared funding and $1 billion for federal-only strategic initiatives. For more information on the national GF2 initiatives, visit agr.gc.ca/GrowingForward2 or manitoba.ca/agriculture and click on Growing Innovation.
September 27, 2013
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The Agri Post
The Good Old Days - Not Always so Good Local. Organic. Hormone free. Gluten free. No pesticides. Nothing artificial. These are the buzzwords in food marketing today. Who can object to all of these wholesome sounding concepts? Food companies are trying to take us back to a time that many consumers imagine as idyllic, pure and healthy. The fact that this is an effective marketing strategy is proven by how many companies are using it. These are not ad campaigns from little stores, but strategic marketing efforts by our largest grocery stores and restaurant chains. Two things strike me about these trends. First off, the “good old days” were not nearly as good as today’s advertising makes them out to be. Some in society seem to want to push producers and farmers back to the rural lifestyle and production practices of the 1940s and 1950s. In other words, houses with no running water, wood heat, a standard of living below poverty, one room school education, even longer work hours, etc. The second thing that strikes me about the latest marketing trends is the portrayal of modern commercial agriculture as being bad for our health and bad for the environment. This view is both wrong and dangerous. I have heard it said that trends like this are the indulgences of a rich society. This statement has a ring of truth as not only will this misinformation about agricultural practices hurt farmers and ranchers, but unchecked, it will have a large impact on those who can least afford to spend more on food. Don’t get me wrong. I applaud every producer who is able to access niche markets like “local” or “organic” and to increase their incomes through hard work and their marketing skills. However, I do have a problem when some of these multi-million dollar marketing campaigns spread inaccurate and damaging information about the way the majority of our food is produced. Let us take a look at some of the claims made by the latest foodie trends, like the notion that food in great-grandma’s time was somehow safer. Canada has a strong science-based food safety system. Year after year, statistics from the Public Health Agency of Canada show that modern agriculture is delivering food that is safer than the year before. The days gone by are not so good when one actually looks at the facts around incidences of food-borne illnesses. What about the claims that agriculture from years gone by had less impact on the environment? Did you know that the drought faced by western Canada in the 1990s and 2000s was in fact worse than the droughts of the “Dirty 30s?” Yet, Manitoba soil did not blow into Ontario because modern production practices, like the use of pesticides and biotechnology, have allowed agriculture to manage the soil and moisture levels better. How could it be good for the environment to go back to the old practices? Modern grazing practices are an integral part of grassland ecosystems and help us meet everyone’s conservation objectives. Economically viable beef production also provides society with many environmental services such as preserving wetlands. Beef production both create jobs as well as delivers important environmental goods and services for all Manitobans. Opposition to antibiotics in livestock production is another advertising trend. But, how can anyone consider it humane not to treat an animal that has become sick? Failure to treat illness is simply not a good management practice and it is not the right way to care for livestock. So how should agriculture respond to this growing romanticized trend towards consumers seeking food produced as if it was 1930? We could just complain about misguided city folk, but that won’t change the way our customers are selling the food we produce. Instead, agriculture needs to get out front and guide these trends. We need to show our urban cousins the effort we make to protect the environment and to care for our animals. This is the only way consumers will be informed about how agricultural production takes place today and how it continues to evolve. This is one of the purposes of the recently revised Code of Practice for the Care and Handling of Beef Cattle. The new code is practical and science-based. Beef producers have had the opportunity for input into the development of the new code. Animal welfare representatives, enforcement agencies and other representatives from civil society were also directly involved in developing the new code. The wide representation will help ensure that our efforts to promote the highest standards of animal care are supported and understood by Canadians. Having a code of practice is step one. Confirming it is being followed will be step two. There may be some who feel that having customers ask, “Are you following the Code of Practice?” is interference in their ranch. But as we have seen in other industries and sectors of agriculture, we can either try to get in front and inform these trends, or have others like Tim Horton’s and Wal-Mart impose arbitrary and impractical standards on us without our consent or input. Many consumers are asking, “Where does my food come from?” We as producers need to be ready to answer this question. Failure to do so will mean others will answer it for us and history has shown that it is never good to have others tell our story.
Commodity Game Shows Off Industry By Les Kletke Patrick Suppess views volunteering at the Amazing Agriculture Adventure as an opportunity. An opportunity to explain the industry he works in and maybe have a little fun along the way. Suppess is a Fertilizer Coordinator for Richardson’s on most days but for a few days of the year, he spends time with Ag in the Classroom projects. He has been a part of the breakfast program that Ag in the Classroom takes to schools for the past three years. In fact, Richardson’s provides the margarine used at the school breakfasts. This year he was hosting one of the Commodity Game stations at the Amazing Agriculture Adventure at Kelbourne Farms. The Commodity Game that Suppess was hosting was not the same game farmers might think of when they hear the name but rather an opportunity to guess which farm products everyday items come from. The fact that margarine and cooking oil originated from canola was a fact that surprised most students and Suppess had a table full of products to keep the youngsters busy during their short visit. Co-ordinator Diane
Patrick Suppess of Richardsons says the Amazing Agriculture Adventure is an opportunity to explain the industry of food production to youngsters and views the time spent as part of the company’s mandate. Photo by Les Kletke
Mauthe said that new organizations are offering to be a part of the event each year and she makes an effort to get them involved. “This year we had Keystone Potato Producer join the event and they had a display with the different types of potatoes and why they are grown, as well as featuring the nutrition of potatoes,” she said. “The industry support continues to grow and more organizations want to get involved. The Amazing Agriculture Adventure not only gets benefits from employees from various companies, but Mauthe said the facil-
ity at Kelbourn farms continues to grow and get better. “This year they have added a huge new annex that will be used for the students to have their lunch and the cookie auction,” she said. “In the past we used a tent that worked well for our needs, but a permanent structure is so much better, and we don’t have to worry about the weather conditions at all.” The annex was completed in the week just before the Amazing Agriculture Adventure and provided a great venue for lunches and the ensuing cookie auction.
Don’t Sell the Farm By Les Kletke The North Dakota branch of the American Farm Bureau had a strong message for its members attending Big Iron in Fargo. “Don’t Sell the Farm,” at least figuratively speaking. John James raises beef cattle on his farm at Hatton, North Dakota and he was staffing the American Farm Bureau booth the first day of the show. He said the response had been positive to the message the group was bringing to farmers. “I have not had one farmer voice opposition to our campaign,” he said. “It is about education. We just want our members to be aware of what could be happening to farm land in the state and they are not aware of it.” James’ case is not about farmers selling their own land but the larger issue of the state selling farmers out to conservation groups, which is gaining momentum in non-rural areas. James said a group that is working under a conservation label is trying to get a referendum on the November ballot that would see $150 million annually going to the conservation group. “There is no one more concerned with conservation than farmers,” he said. “The changes to reduced and zero tillage are good for farmers and good for conservation, but we don’t need them legislated.” He said that 25 residents can be the sponsoring committee and bring the issue forward and then if 4 percent of the population sign the petition the issue is placed on the ballot next election. That would be 26,904 signatures and he said that is a real possibility for the conservation measure that would see $150 million allocated to the group. “That may not seem like much at a time when the State has a $1. 6 billion surplus but that is enough money to buy 25 average farms a year or 150 acres of farmland every day and when it is taken out of agricultural production it is gone,” said James. He said clearly, that the Farm Bureau is not opposed to conservation but it is opposed to other groups making decisions about farms and what farmers can do with their land.
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The Agri Post
Caramelized Hay Is Sweet to Dairy Cattle, but May Sour on Nutrition Dairy cattle love it, dairy nutritionists hate it and dairy producers often feed it. When hay is baled or stacked at moistures above 18 percent, it can create a favourable environment for mould growth. As moulds thrive in moist hay they generate a lot heat, which under the right conditions may caramelise different essential dairy nutrients together. As a result, it creates sweet-smelling caramel-coloured hay that is consumed by dairy cows with exceptional vigour, but is not particularly safe or nutritious. Dairy producers that feed caramelized hay to their dairy cattle should take samples for mould and nutrient testing and make the necessary nutrient adjustments to respective dairy diets to order to assure that the health and production of dairy cattle is never compromised. That’s because, caramelized heatdamaged hay undergoes adverse nutrient transformation in an aerobic process known as the ‘Browning Reaction’, which often occurs when the temperatures of the poorly cured hay reaches 60°C (140 °F). It is a non-enzymatic reaction, which binds the heated forages’ carbohydrates and proteins together, and thus renders a large portion of dietary proteins unavailable to dairy livestock. If left unchecked, a Browning reaction of hay can also lead to spontaneous combustion and devastating bale fires. This is probed temperatures of about 82°C (180 °F). Luckily, most heated-hay bales won’t burst into flames, but when dairy producers open up some of these bales they might see brownish- caramel discolouration, which can be an unmistakable sign for possible damage to its protein content. In order to measure the extent of protein rendered unusable by heating, producers should take the appropriate forage samples and request an ADIN (Acid Detergent Insoluble Nitrogen) analysis at a feed-testing laboratory. Once this ADIN result is sent back, producers can get a good idea as to the ADF-CP (re: measure of crude protein unavailable to the dairy animal) and the ACP (re: adjusted crude protein, available for animal production, which is calculated when the ADF-CP is greater than 10 percent of the tested CP in forage samples). Consider an example of a caramelized alfalfa-grass forage sample reporting an 18 percent protein and ADIN of 0.62 percent. We wish to calculate its final ACP, which is a simple matter of using the following three-step calculations: 1. ADF – CP from ADIN: ADIN % x 6.25 or 0.62 x 6.25 = 3.9 % 2. ADF-CP as a % of total forage CP: 3.9/18 x 100 = 21.7 % 3. ACP = CP % x [100 – (ADF-CP % - 10 %)]: 18 x [100 – (21.7 – 10)] or 15.9 % The final calculation yields an ACP of 15.9 percent as the new protein value of this alfalfa-grass mixture compared to its original value of 18 percent. It is this ACP value that should be used when formulating this particular caramelized hay as a portion of total forages into a dairy diet (re: assume all values in the forage sample/example are based on a dm basis). We should keep in mind that this is still heat-damaged hay. Regardless of what salvageable forage dietary proteins that it contains, the major goal of feeding such caramelized hay is to do so without doing any damage to the health and performance of any particular group of dairy cattle. Here are some suggestions to help deal with a caramelized heat-damaged hay problem: - Do not feed mouldy heat-damaged hay. Discoloured caramelized hay often has white patches of mould interlaced between the stems and leaves of stored hay. Mould significantly reduces the energy and protein content of forages as well as forage digestibility. Mycotoxins produced by forage moulds will likely compromise cattle health and performance. - Limit feed mould-free heat-damaged hay. If the laboratory confirmed that it is safe to feed (re: mycotoxin tests) and ACP adjustments to the ration can be made, formulate a small ground portion of this compromised forage into the overall dairy diet (re: total mixed ration). Maximize the amount of silage or better quality hay fed, given your total forage inventory, and mix it with small amounts of caramelized forage. - Sort your total hay inventory according to its quality. Save the best-harvested hay for your high milk producing dairy cows. Feed your caramelized forage in a balanced diet to loafing animals such as faraway dry cows and replacement heifer stock. As mentioned, avoid feeding any mouldy forage to any dairy livestock. - Use as a dietary straw replacement. There are many incidences where ½ to one kilo of cereal straw are added to lactation diets to slowdown the rate of feed passage in milking cows. Similar amounts of mould-free caramelized hay might be incorporated into high producing lactation diets for the same reasons. - Feed only to growing-finishing dairy steer diets. For similar reasons as a straw substitute, one might incorporate 10-15 percent of mould-free/heat-damaged (tested) forage in the appropriate back grounding dairy steer diets. It would replace straw or low-quality forages that are commonly formulated in these diets. - Investigate the purchase of better quality hay. One must calculate the economic consequences of purchasing higher quality forages and resulting milk performance compared to compromising milk production by feeding poor heat-damaged hay. Unfortunately, when a wet prairie summer is widespread good quality hay is usually hard to find. Nobody advocates the widespread feeding of caramelized heat-damaged hay to dairy cattle. Heating of poorly cured hay is caused by mould growth, which can produce unsafe levels of mycotoxins and also can lead to significant forage nutrient losses, particularly to its available protein content. However, there exists some caramelized heat-damaged hay that might be safely fed to dairy cattle and although it is not a total replacement for high quality hay for dairy cattle, it might prove useful in situations of limited hay inventories, even if we consider one of the recommendations listed above.
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The Agri Post
The Agri Post
Agricultural Bug Comes from Volunteer Opportunity By Les Kletke Brian Straub is the Vice Principal of River East Collegiate in Winnipeg and he sees the Amazing Agricultural Adventure as an opportunity for his students, not to attend and visit the stations explaining the industry of agriculture (that is reserved for grades 4 and 5) but to volunteer and help others learn the industry. “Of course they do learn about the industry as they prepare for the event and when they are shuttling the students between stations they can’t help but pick up some information,” said Straub. His school has been providing volunteers for the event for the last 5 years. This year the students were part of the Career Internship Program that provides students with a period with a perspective employer. When asked if students from River East ever have the agriculture bug after volunteering, Straub replied, “Yes, we have had students come back after this event and say they would like to learn more about the industry and work in agriculture,” he said. “We then try to place them with agriculture companies for their intern-
Kanisha Szekely is from River East Collegiate and spent a day volunteering at the Amazing Agriculture Adventure. She plans to enter the faculty of education next year and says the experience was a great one. Photo by Les Kletke
ship. In some cases, it has worked very well. This was their introduction to the industry.” Kanisha Szekely was one of
the volunteers this year. She is on Student Council at River East and plans to attend university next year. Her plans are to study Education and
then teach English in other parts of the world. “I was hooked on agriculture after grade 10 geography,” she said. “This gave me a chance to learn more about the industry and get some volunteer hours on my resume.” She was at a station that explained some of the uses of agricultural products, “Who knew gelatine was made from pig’s hooves, or that animals were used for the production of toothpaste?” She said the daylong event gave her a better understanding of the industry as well as some first hand training on what being a teacher would be like. The bag of marshmallows at her display caused the most interest and youngsters were just as interested in trying them as knowing what the ingredients were. Straub said the event is a great fit with his school because it gives senior students the opportunity to volunteer in the community while not taking a huge time commitment from their other classes. “They get to try it for a day,” he said. “They are not away from their other classes for an extended period of time. It is something our school has been involved with for a while and we appreciate it because we don’t have the opportunity to show our students agriculture and very few if any come from a farm background.”
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Farmer Mak es Makes Surprising Find On September 21 at approximately 2 pm, Prairie Mountain Area RCMP was contacted by a local farmer in the RM of ShellmouthBoulton, north of Riding Mountain National Park. The unsuspecting farmer informed RCMP there were unknown plants growing amongst his oat crop over an area of approximately 20 acres. RCMP attended the location and immediately identified the suspicious plants to be marihuana near harvesting stage. With the assistance of Manitoba Conservation and Water Stewardship, and the complainant, RCMP seized 146 plants. There is no re-
port of damage to the surrounding oat crop. No charges have been laid as of yet but the investigation continues.
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
The Agri Post
September 27, 2013
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Bit of Danger, Lots of Activity By Les Kletke The bee station proved one of the most popular at the Amazing Agricultural Adventure and Lori Ann Kaminski had suggestions as to why. “It included a bit of danger and lots of activity,” said Kaminski. Of course, the danger was overplayed as the bees were sealed in a glass container and had
no possibility of getting out among the students. “The look on their face is shock when I ask them to come up to the front,” she said with a smile. “Their parents are always telling them to stay away from bees or wasps and now I ask them to come up to the front of the display, so it seems pretty exciting.” Kaminski was pressed into action as the bee resource
Lori Ann Kaminiski demonstrates the cycle of a bee’s life at the Amazing Ag Adventure. It was one of the most popular stations at the event, having live bees working behind glass. Photo by Les Kletke
Amazing Agriculture Adventure By Les Kletke Diane Mauthe will always have a job. The Co-ordinator of the Amazing Agriculture Adventure has new students that are coming along every year. This year, just as it has
been for the past several, the event was full to capacity, “We had a waiting list but we had a few drop out and we were able to accommodate everyone. Some had to drop out because of other events like picture day or something like that but we
have had a tremendous response from the schools.” The 3-day event at Kelbourne Farms and the University of Manitoba’s Glenlea Research station attracts over a thousand students to the stations that feature different as-
A new annex as part of the complex at Kelbourn Farm provided a great place for lunch and the ensuing cookie auction for those attending the Amazing Agriculture Adventure. The structure was completed the week before the event. Photo by Les Kletke
pects of agricultural production in Manitoba. “We had over 1,000 students this year,” she said, “We have had up to 1,200, depending on the class size and the schools involved. The program is geared for grades 4 and 5 and this year, for the first time, included a special needs class from a Winnipeg high school. “The teacher heard about the program and thought it would be a good fit so she applied,” said Mauthe, who concentrates more on getting the message of agriculture to students than the exact parameters of the class size or make up. She values the volunteers she gets from High Schools and said it is a two way street. “They are a tremendous asset with the program, helping shuttle students between the stations and keeping things moving, but they also learn something about agriculture during their time at the program.” Mauthe also gets tremendous support from industry.
The resource people at various stations take time from their jobs to spend a day explaining their industry to the 16 groups of students that come through each day. Companies also help with donations and the cookie auction gives students a chance to participate in a real live auction for their desert. Bidding is done with money that they earned by asking questions at the stations they have visited through the morning. The event at Kelbourne Farm was held September 1719. A similar event for western Manitoba was held in June and plans are underway for a northwest event to be held in Russell next spring. For Diane Mauthe it is time to begin getting commitments for next year’s events because she knows there will be another crop of Grade 4 and 5 student’s ready to have an Amazing Agriculture Adventure and learn about the industry that provides their food.
person when the regular “bee lady” could not attend the Amazing Agriculture Adventure because of family commitments. “She was amazing,” said Kaminski. “She was so knowledgeable and has a great way of getting the kids involved.” Kaminski was not unaware of the industry having kept hives herself several times. She donned the full apiarist attire for the arrival of each group and asked the students if they knew what kind of farmer she was, most shouted out the answer before she could survey the group. She laughed saying. “I am supposed to hand out the cash based on the questions they ask, but at this station the questions keep coming and every group has so many good questions it is difficult to decide.” The cash that students earned by their question were used for the cookie auction at lunch and the group with the most cash got the most desirable cookies, double chocolate. Some less active classes were relegated to the oatmeal cookies. Kaminski said that the appearance of possible danger and the fact that the bees were moving around in the cut away hive added to the popularity of the display. “The bees are working and when we explain what they are doing, the kids just love to watch them,” she said. “And there is no real danger of being stung.”
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
The Agri Post
Equipment Helps with Zambian Prison Farm Self-Sufficiency and Exports By Les Kletke Daisy Musonda readily admits that not all the equipment she saw at Big Iron in Fargo, North Dakota had an application on her farm, or those of her fellow citizens for that matter, but some of the equipment would be welcomed by Zambian farmers. “We produce a lot of cotton in Zambia,” said Musonda, as she took a break from visiting displays at the Fargo Fairgrounds and waited for her travelling partner to make his selection from the row of food booths that offered a selection not usually a part of the Zambian diet. “I have not seen any cotton equipment here,” she said with a smile. “But we also produce a lot of maize and the equipment would fit well in the maize production especially the irrigation equipment.” While she works for a company that purchases cotton from farmers and further processes it, she also has her own farm of 400 ha. on which she grows cotton and maize. Part of the delegation she was travelling with was looking to purchase equipment for use on prison farms. “The farms are operated by the prisons and the prisoners provide the labour. These
Daisy Musonda was in North Dakota to look for farm equipment for her farm in Zambia. She was pleased with what she saw but made no purchases. Photo by Les Kletke
farms are looking to update their equipment and are here to look at modern technology,”
she said. The farms not only produce food for the prisoners but the profits from com-
modity sales helps cover the cost of the operation of the penal system. She said that the prison farms were similar to private farms in terms of much of the labour being done manually. “The harvesting, weeding and spraying are done mostly by hand and in cotton that is a lot of work,” she said. “We are looking for equipment that can mechanize those parts of production.” Musonda said that agriculture as an industry is making great strides in her country and is attaining selfsufficiency. “We are exporting a good deal of maize to the Congo,” said Muscoda. “The potential of exports is good but the first step is increasing production and water is a limiting factor for our crops. We are looking for irrigation equipment.” She said that most of the exports from Zambia go to the neighbouring countries of Liberia, Congo, Nigeria, and Tanzania. The trip for Musonda and the others in her delegation was sponsored by the North Dakota Export Office, and while the primary purpose was to visit the Big Iron Trade Show, the group did have some extra time to visit North Dakota businesses and establish contacts in the agricultural area.
No Pineapple Equipment, Yet
By Les Kletke Britany Posey is the Communications and Membership Manager of the North Dakota Trade Office and no time it is as busy for her as the time in September that Fargo hosts Big Iron. The office itself sponsors trade delegations to visit North Dakota as well as co-ordinate displays from North Dakota companies that are trying to lure business from off-shore markets. No request goes without attention and no request is too far from the realm of possibility. This year she fielded a request for pineapple equipment and while the question may seem laughable at first it may turn into an opportunity for a North Dakota firm. Sanusi Idowu Dauda is the Chief Financial Analyst with Dansa Foods in Nigeria and he was in Fargo looking for pineapple equipment, specifically a machine that could
transplant his pineapple seedlings. Posey did not have to check the show program. She knew that none of the exhibitors would be offering the machine that Dauda was seeking but there was a possibility his needs could be met. “Perhaps there is a fabricator that could make a machine for me,” he offered. That was a real possibility. The inventiveness of farmers is universal worldwide and Dauda knew that the North Dakota manufacturers had access to much more equipment than those of his native country. He was about to set out on a search for a fabricator that could make the machine he was looking for to transplant pineapple sets and with that Posey could very well help him. He may not have been able to take it home with him but the first steps may have been taken. For Posey, it is all in a day’s work, along with hosting over 100 buyers from 10 countries and all the demands that come with them. She is not content with hosting only inbound missions but is also on the lookout for large agricultural shows that would be a good fit for North Dakota exhibitors. She was evaluating several in Europe and the former Soviet Union. She said that while eastern Europe was an area of interest several years ago the channels
have now been established and North Dakota firms are doing fine on their own establishing trade with companies in the former Soviet Union and attention has turned to Africa as
the next emerging area with potential for agricultural development. North Dakotans may not have pineapple transplanters in stock but they are willing to try to make a few.
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Insuring YYour our Grain There are a number of different properties on your farm that you may not have thought to insure. The Threshed Grain Floater is an important consideration when you consider the high values. All farm policies need to be reviewed. When placing coverage on your grain, you insure to the maximum value that you have
on hand at any one time throughout the year. The annual premium takes into consideration the fact that this maximum amount is typically for a relatively short time. Threshed Grain Floaters vary greatly. For example, some companies provide theft coverage while located on a vacant yard while others provide only to a maximum of 10% of your total limit but some do not cover theft at all. Theft coverage is the main concern but also important is coverage for collision, fire and wind. Be sure to seek advice and purchase insurance from those who understand your business. Andy Anderson is an Associate Insurance Broker specializing in General, Life and Group Benefits for Farm, Commercial/Agri-business T 204-746-5589, F 866-765-3351, andya@rempelinsurance.com / rempelinsurance.com /valleyfinancial.ca.
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
Milking with Robotics Cost Effective By Harry Siemens
The cows in the Skyline Dairies barn can eat when they want and as much as they like.
Robotics is changing things in the dairy industry, as witnessed in a recent visit to Skyline Dairy Ltd, the dairy farm of David and Charles Wiens at Grunthal. In a tour of the barn, that is void of human life for a large part of the time, Wiens stopped first at the feed bunk, where the cows start their never-ending journey. “They can eat all they want, when they want, but to leave this area, they have to come through a smart gate,” said David. “It reads the transponder and the number of the cow, segregating her. If eligible, the gate allows her into the milking parlour waiting area. The ones not eligible, the smart gate diverts back to the feed bunk area.” The owner sets the parameters for each cow. “If we have a fresh cow that is producing considerably more milk, we set it to milk every four hours,” said David. “We do it simply because of production variation. [When] a cow comes to the end of her lactation, it won’t justify milking her three times a day.” Once inside the milking area the cows wait patiently, but eagerly for their turn at the milking machine anticipating the treat they are about to receive. The milking area holds up to 10 cows, preventing crowding. “If there is one that doesn’t want to wait, feels like walking through to the other side, it won’t work because all the gates and the milker communicate with each other through the program,” he said. “The cows can’t leave the area until milked. They can return but only to the feed bunk area.” The gate that lets the cows out after milking can also recognize if the machine in fact milked the cow or not. The real advantage of this system is they can set the parameters for each individual cow. The barn has four milking units milking four cows at the same time. With 200 cows, they need to keep those four units going. Each costs about $200,000 plus installation. On average, the number of milkings per day is three times. While random to some extent, they also control the milking, but the cows are completely on their own schedule. They make a counterclockwise motion through the barn with 100 on one side and the other 100 on the other side of the four milking stations, each area has access to two milkers. “What I like about this system, there is no crowding in the milking parlour,” said Wiens. “We don’t have cows standing around here that don’t need to be here.” Once finished milking, a oneway gate returns them to an-
Since installing the DeLaval Robotic milkers in their dairy barn five years ago, production per cow per day went from 32 litres to 35 litres.
While the cows eat, or relax or simply visit, the automated feeding and manure removal systems do their work too.
other feeder bunk area and they can eat as much as they want and rest in the stall area. “Some go back into their own stalls,” he said. “Cows are like people, they have their own favourite spot. Often a cow will use the same stall, or at least in the same area. We have more stalls than cows.” The herdsman’s role changes in a dairy barn with robotic milkers because it gives more time to focus on cow management than doing the actual milking, removing most of the menial tasks. For Wiens it pays off. “The production is about 34 to 35 litres per cow per day,” he said. “Before, the production would max out at 32 litres per cow per day.” Wiens said never forget to have a good herds manager because a dairy farmer can have the best machines in the world, but they need good management. In addition, working with the company that supplies the feed supplements and analysis to yield optimum production is very helpful. Before using the robotic milkers in their barn someone had to be in the barn most of the time, especially if milking three times a day and looking after the cows. Now the robots replace all of the smaller tasks. “Because we are not here watching all the time, we still need to know what is going
on,” Wiens said. “Each milking station reports everything that happens including how much milk the cows produce, the last time the cow was in the milker station, or report whether a cow kicked off a milker once or even two times.” This shows the herds manager how each cow performs by reading the records of every teat per cow per milking. “For example, what if the cow gave half the amount of milk since the last milking,” said Wiens. “The system will flag the cow and you can go back and check. Or if the cow hasn’t been into the milking station within the last 12 hours, same thing, check.” Before the herds manager would come into the barn, check the cows and see what was happening. The first thing done now is to check the reports to get specific information on the cows. “Now we are looking for a certain cow instead of looking around generally because the system has flagged her and we look for the problem,” he said. “Is she is sick or just plain lazy.” The Wiens brothers built a new 240-cow free stall barn in 2007 with a 4-stall DeLavell robotic milking system. David said automating the feeding, milking, and barn cleaning systems saves them an estimated $80,000 annually.
The Agri Post
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September 27, 2013
The Agri Post
The Agri Post
From Worst Land to Best Crop By Les Kletke When Randy Dowdy bought his farm, the county agent told him it was some of the worst farmland in the state of Georgia. Last year he was named the top corn producer in the world with a yield of 374 bushels an acre. “You have to get thinking that any time that ground is uncovered it is a bad thing,” said Dowdy from the tent of the Red River Farm Network at Big Iron in Fargo. The farm network brought Dowdy in to speak to farmers about top yields and soil management. He drew one of the largest crowds at the event. He said that people normally think that top yields, and especially those that capture national titles, have to come from farms that are on superb land, at the bottom of an old river bed.” That is not the case. The farm that he purchased was extremely low on organic matter and he made that his cause. “I decided to work with the land that I had and improve it as much as I could,” he said. “So I began double cropping to keep the land covered all the time and have more organic matter going back into the soil.” He usually grows peas after corn. He seeds corn in early February and has already harvested this year’s crop but is sworn to secrecy on this year’s yield. After harvesting the corn, he seeds peas, which usually yield 40-45 bushels an acre. “Not bad for a crop that wasn’t producing even a few years ago,” he said with a smile. “It is good for the land and works in the budget.” Gowdy said that his top yields come from his approach to farming. “I think of the yield potential we have at seeding, which is probably about 700 bushels, but yet in many cases we only get about 200 bushels an acre. If you did that in school you would be failing so why accept it on your farm?” he asked. “I try to do everything I can to reduce the stress on the plant and keep it growing to its potential.” He walks all his fields himself, “If you’re the guy who pays, you should be the guy who walks because no one cares as much as
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It’s Time to Evaluate Your Cowherd Mineral Program By Peter Vitti
Randy Doudy was last year’s World Corn Yield champion. Ironically, when he bought his farm the local county agent said it was the worst land in the state. Photo by Les Kletke
you do.” He tries to walk all his fields every week. Gowdy has also gone to double rows in his corn, “It was equipment we had from peanuts, it worked for double cropping corn, and it has shown a great benefit. He credits seed companies with great advancements in the genetics of crops and said that it is up to farmers to try to reach the potential of the genetics of today’s seed. While he does acknowledge that, the climate of Georgia does give him some cropping advantages he said there are some advantages of the frozen north. “Compaction is a real issue for us,” he said. “We don’t have the frost to take away any of the compaction in the tracks so we are very careful with putting tracks in our fields.
Pumpkins by No Other Name By Les Kletke There is an old business adage that says the name of your company should tell the customers what you do. If that is the case Pumpkins by Penner has it right, they do pumpkins of every size and sort. The farm near Steinbach has 2 1/2 acres of pumpkins and 1/2 acre of gourds that they turn into entertainment of every sort. They sell the pumpkins from their farmyard and at the Pine Ridge Farmers Market along with other produce but the orange orbs is their mainstay. Lorissa Penner said that they have been able to find early ripening varieties that have them selling ripe fruit by early September. “There are some varieties that are ready in 86 days, so with an early start we can have ripe pumpkins by September and the heat of this year helped with things,” said Penner, who along with her mother Shirley provides most of the labour for the operation that also has a dining room that accommodates 250 guests. The yard also has a petting zoo featuring sheep, pigs and several types of chickens. “We have a group coming from a hog operation so that means removing the pig and cleaning the pen to at least a foot deep,” said Shirley. “We have to do that to avoid any contamination.” She accepts the biosecurity measures as part of doing business; realizing contamination of animals in the industry could have wide reaching effects. The yard has a playground and wheat box for youngsters as well as a trail through the forest that has visitors trying to find Mary’s little lamb in the school yard and little Bo Beep’s sheep in another area. “We get a lot of schools visiting in the springtime on field days, “said Shirley.”So we try to teach them something about agriculture, we have little plots of different crops to show them, as well as questions about what is made from different farm products.” Visits have been growing steadily over the past several years and the Penners’ keep adding to the pathway and to the features in the playground. This past summer the Penners’ hosted over 2,000 school children on school tours and were open to families during the summer. “We are open from the May long weekend through the last Friday in October, “said Lorissa.”And that is the end of pumpkin season.” Pumpkins serve all purposes at Penner Pumpkins. This one adds new meaning to Pumpkin Head. Photo by Les Kletke
Autumn is a great time to assess your cowherd mineral program and choose a good beef cow mineral that best fits your operation. Beef producers should purchase good quality commercial cattle mineral that contains balanced levels of essential minerals and vitamins. Some of these essential trace minerals such as copper, zinc, manganese and selenium are actually required in higher amounts during gestation compared to the cow’s immediate days after calving. When consumed in nutritionally required amounts by the cowherd they promote good gestation health for the next several months and up to the calving season. Unseen by our naked eye, microscopic amounts (re: milligrams) of copper, zinc, manganese and selenium act as “on switches” in specialized proteins (enzymes), which in turn are activated antioxidants, destroying dangerous “free radicals” produced during a normal immune response against disease. Without sufficient levels of these essential trace minerals in the cow’s body to activate these protective enzymes, free radical compounds would be simply allowed to multiply. As a result, they oxidize and destroy vital immune cells and thus may compromise the entire cows’ immune system. These same trace minerals that are important during a cow’s pregnancy are also circulated through her placenta and help develop the fetus/calf’s protective immune system as well as contribute to antibody-enriched colostrum production. For example, a recent study performed at the University of Liege in Belgium fed 0.5 mg/kg selenium (via selenium yeast) to Belgian Blue cows. It was found that these cows gave their superior selenium status to their unborn calves through the placenta and this transfer continued once the calves were born by consuming higher selenium in the colostrum and later milk. Such cow-calf pairs were judged by the researchers to be the healthiest animals of the experiment. Another reason we want to build up immunity in gestating beef cows with a good mineral program is that most post-calving cow vaccination programs become much more effective. It is well established that many cattle fail to acquire good “vaccination take” (increase antibody titers); not because there is something wrong with vaccine, but beef cows are marginally or severely deficient in certain trace minerals that are essential for a strong immune response. Furthermore, no vaccine seems to be effective without good trace mineral status in fledging new beef calves as they convert from a passive to permanent immune system. Fortunately, a good cattle mineral program in pregnant cows can be chosen and fed for the next six months with relative ease. It’s a matter of feeding a well-balanced commercial cattle mineral that complements the macro-minerals of provided forages as well as meets all their respective trace-mineral and vitamin requirements. Consider six parameters of a good cattle mineral taken from the guaranteed analysis and feeding directions of a common feed label: 1. Complementary macro-minerals to your forages: Calcium and phosphorus are listed as percentages and usually formulated in either a 2:1 or 1:1 ratio. For example: an autumn-over wintering cattle mineral might contain at least 9 - 12 % P to complement inadequate P levels found in mature forages and stubble pastures. 2. Good trace mineral levels: A good cow mineral should contain levels of copper, zinc, manganese, cobalt, iodine and selenium that at least meet the cow’s NRC requirements to prevent a basic or “primary deficiency”. Some minerals are fortified with extra trace minerals such as copper to correct “secondary” mineral deficiencies caused by dietary factors that bind up it up and make much of it biologically unavailable to the cow. 3. Trace minerals of greater bioavailability: Some research suggests that cattle fed “organic or chelated” trace minerals (i.e. mineral proteinates) respond more favourably to disease challenges or stressful conditions due to assured a good trace mineral status/strong immune system. This class of specialized trace minerals offers advantages of superior absorption, retention and metabolism in the cow’s body compared to respective inorganic trace minerals. 4. Adequate A, D and E levels: Vitamin A and D are often included to meet the cattle’s own respective requirements. In particular, Vitamin A is involved in the immune response against pathogens, where it is required for the production of white blood cells to fight disease. Vitamin E plays an anti-oxidant role in animal cells, which is also associated with a strong immune system. 5. Feeding Directions: The general recommendation to meet the mineral and vitamin requirements of gestation beef cows is to feed commercial cattle minerals so that each cow should be consuming between 56 - 112 grams (2 - 4 oz) of salt-free minerals per day. If salt makes up at least 25 % of this mineral, one should adjust suggested mineral intakes accordingly. 6. Purchase price of the cow mineral: There are several features of a commercial cow mineral that are discussed in #1-6, which determine its purchase price. A standard cow mineral cost about $25 - 30 per 25 kg bag and a special fortified cow mineral (i.e. organic trace mineral) may cost up to $45 per 25 kg. In most autumn situations, it is a cost-effective exercise to implement a well-balanced mineral feeding program for gestation beef cows that closely matches their increasing mineral demands as the fetus grows inside each cow, as well it helps build up their immunity against disease. The profitable value of such timely mineral programs can be ultimately measured with a healthy freshened cow and her healthy newborn calf.
CFGB Projects Seeing Some Bumper Harvests By Elmer Heinrichs Harold Penner, Co-ordinator of Manitoba Canadian Foodgrains Bank (CFGB) projects, reports that “looking back over the past several weeks, quite a few projects have done some harvesting, and I keep getting reports of excellent yields.” Combined with quite strong prices, this means that Manitoba will be privileged to provide strong support for our overseas work this year. “I just love it when I get texts like I did a few days ago from Mike Kleinsasser at Milltown. Earlier he hoped the 50 acres of canola growing for CFGB would do 30 bushels per acre. But when the combines left the field, they had harvested 55! Awesome!” says Penner. “It appears that most of the wheat is going upwards of 60 bushels per acres and most canola in that 50-bushel range.”
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The Agri Post
September 27, 2013
European Technology in American Corn Fields
Mortensen said the European designed Capello head is heavier than other heads on the market and will handle the higher volumes now seen in corn crop yields. The heads are built in South Dakota at a plant constructed in 2011 and expanded last year. “Most of the technology on the market was developed in the 1980’s and the crop has changed a lot since then,” he said. “The yields have increased dramatically and along with that the amount of product that has to be dealt with has increased as well.” The angle of the cutting knives relative to the head is different on the European made head. “The angle of the blade is different and creates a vortex that allows for more efficient chopping,” he said. “It also is made in 3-inch sections, which make it easier to work on if it does need repair.” The company offers its heads in both folding and rigid models. The folding head with both sides folding in and over the center section of the header caused a good deal of attention at the North Dakota show. While it has been a common technology in Europe, the folding head is still relatively new in North American markets and producers where interested in the compact head when folded for transport. Mortensen also emphasized the single drive aluminum gearbox, which reduced weight and allowed the cutting to be done as early as possible and saves any shelled crop.
Winter Wheat is Doing Well... Coming Off and Going In
Larry Mortenson says European technology in corn headers could be an advantage to North American farmers as yields increase and stover becomes an issue. Photo by Les Kletke
By Les Kletke Larry Mortensen is not sure if a Capello corn header will help Manitoba producers who are concerned about the spread of Goss’s Wilt in corn but he thinks the head may be of some advantage. The disease over-winters in corn stover and spreads to following crops. He said that the Capello corn head provides a much more extensive chop of the corn stalks that aids in the disintegration of the stalks in the field. “Farmers that use the corn for grazing after harvest find it a big advantage,” said Mortenson. “The pieces are smaller and easier for the animal to bite and chew.” Mortenson was one of several hundred exhibitors on hand at Big Iron in Fargo, North Dakota and said that his company is in the process of establishing a dealer network in western Canada, “We have dealers in Saskatchewan and are in the process of establishing in Manitoba.”
The day Jonathan and Jack Siemens of Plum Coulee finished harvesting their winter wheat, was the day the 2014 winter wheat crop was going in.
By Harry Siemens The winter wheat harvest in south central Manitoba did well for one farmer, Jonathan Siemens, who farms northeast of Plum Coulee. On September 5, his winter wheat for 2014 was going into the ground. As in some cases, with farmers who plant winter wheat year after year, he’s often planting and combining at the same time. Taking off this year’s crop, which was planted in the fall of the previous year, and seeding the winter wheat he hopes to harvest the following year. In Siemens’ case, he finished his 2013 crop by the end of August and immediately turned around and planted his crop for 2014. On 345 acres planted last fall Siemens figures, and not everything has gone to the elevator yet, his average yield was as high as 85 bushels per acre. “Best profitable crop on our farm,” he said. “Last year averaged $7.43 a bushel and 71 bushels per acre. This year’s average price about $6.68 and 85 bushels per acre makes it the most profitable crop at least for two years running, maybe three.” He said the protein this year is unbelievably high at 12 percent as an average premium yield. “Some spring wheat I’ve heard has less protein than our winter wheat this year.” In 2012, Siemens planted his Falcon winter wheat variety on August 31 and this year, a new variety that has milling quality, AC Flourish, on September 5. “If I seed the old Falcon variety, I get only feed status next year. The new CDC Flourish gets milling quality,” he added. In addition, there is another winter wheat variety on the horizon, called AC Emerson, developed by Dr. Rob Graf with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada in Lethbridge. It is scheduled for broad-scale introduction in the fall of 2014. Brent Derkatch, the Director of Operations and Business Development with Canterra Seeds, said seed supplies for western Canada’s first fusarium resistant wheat will be broadly available next fall. The variety offers good leaf stems and stripe rust resistance. It is the first variety of any class in western Canada to receive the resistant to fusarium head blight rating and, while suited to all winter wheat growing areas in western Canada, the focus will be on areas with higher incidences of fusarium head blight, primarily the eastern prairies and potentially southern Alberta. When talking to Siemens, he said there was no incidence of fusarium in his crop this year. Derkatch said with the proposed move of CDC Falcon to the general-purpose class next August there’s a lot of interest in AC Emerson. Its disease resistance is also attracting attention. “We’ve just finished having the second seed production crop harvested here this fall,” he said. “Yields are very, very good as many crops and many varieties have been yielding very well this year. It is quite common to have yields in the 80 and 90 bushels per acre, which is very, very good.” Derkatch said that overall, Canterra Seeds had about 1,000 acres in western Canada of seed production and much more planned for next year. “We’re taking orders now and we don’t have a final number on exactly how much seed we should anticipate will be available next year but it will be quite significant with that primary supply based in eastern Saskatchewan and southern Manitoba,” he said. “Mother Nature needs to cooperate a little bit for us here as well. We’re relatively dry in many areas so we’re going to need some moisture for producers or seed growers in this case, to be able to successfully get winter wheat established this fall.” Derkatch said they have to do more market development and understand where the end use quality fits and clearly believes that AC Emerson is going to be a valuable variety for producers.
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On a Mission at Big Iron Central and Eastern Farmers Reap a Bountiful Harvest By Elmer Heinrichs
This group from the Ukraine was on a mission at Big Iron. They wanted grain processing equipment that would convert grain to feed for the country’s expanding hog industry. Photo by Les Kletke
By Les Kletke Yulia Zubova had a reason for coming to Big Iron in Fargo. She was looking for grain processes equipment for her company’s feed division. “We are looking for extruding equipment that will process soybeans and milling equipment that we can use to process grain for the feed division of our company,” said Zubova. She is the International Relations Manager of Agrarian Union of Donbass, a private company that has 10 divisions each supplying to or purchasing from farmers in the Ukraine. Donbass is a state of 52,000 sq. km known for its rich black soils, which are more that a metre deep throughout most of the region. Zubova said the company is expanding as agriculture develops in her country and is looking for modern technology that will bring efficiencies to Ukrainian farms formerly run as collectives. “We are looking for modern ways to process the crops and turn them into livestock feed for Ukrainian farms,” she said. She is well aware of the concept of adding value to a product before exporting it and indicated that the company’s role was not in the export of raw grain but rather in processing the grain domestically and returning it to farms where it could be transformed to meat. “The company has large holdings and for the last three years has been building pellet mills,” she said. “But we would like to expand that further and are looking for a manufacturer of extruding equipment. Soybeans are expanding in acreage and we see that they can be an excellent food source in the production of pork.” While the trip to Big Iron in Fargo did not yield her any immediate success, she was confident that the group would be successful in establishing contacts that could deliver the equipment she needed. She found the livestock handling equipment an interesting display but not suited to her needs. “Our company is not in the business of agricultural production,” she said. “We buy from farmers and sell to farmers.” While many international visitors are in awe of the size of equipment on display at the North Dakota show, the Ukrainian delegation was not overwhelmed. “Our farms have advanced in the last 10 years and production equipment on the farms is good,” she said. “We are looking for equipment that will work in further processing of the crops like soybeans as our pork production increases and new operations are developed.” She was cautious about exact numbers but said pig production was increasing in her country. Yulia Zubova was at Big Iron for a reason, she had a shopping list of equipment her company needed and she intended to fill it. The farmers of the Ukraine are waiting for new efficiencies.
Clubroot Symptoms Found on Canola in Manitoba Manitoba Agriculture, Food and Rural Initiatives (MAFRI) advises, that in August and September, plants from two unrelated fields showed symptoms of clubroot galls on their roots. Further testing has resulted in a positive clubroot DNA analysis of both plant samples. Due to these results, the department says Manitoba can no longer be considered free of clubroot disease. The discovery of clubroot symptoms in Manitoba had been considered likely, as clubroot DNA had been confirmed previously in soil samples unrelated to these fields. With awareness of the potential for development in Manitoba, growers and industry members have been monitoring canola more closely for signs of the disease. MAFRI reminds farmers to follow best management and disease prevention practices as they prepare for the 2014 crop year. Workshops to discuss reduction of pest movement and biosecurity for crop producers will be delivered by the department in the upcoming months. Proper equipment cleaning, specifically to reduce the movement of soil on field equipment, is key to reducing the risk of spreading this soil-borne disease. The use of clubroot-resistant crop varieties, proper crop rotation and good weed management of alternate hosts will help prevent heavier infestations from developing within a field where a disease may already be present at undetected levels. Clubroot can cause economic yield losses in host crops including canola. The disease survives in soil as hardy, resting spores, with a half-life of four years, but it has the capacity to survive up to 20 years. Once established in a field, clubroot requires long-term management. Because canola is an important crop to Manitoba producers, MAFRI, in collaboration with the Manitoba Canola Growers Association and the Canola Council of Canada, is developing information for producers to ensure canola’s continued profitability in the province. For more information, contact MAFRI’s Crops Knowledge Centre at 204-745-5630.
Manitoba grain farmers are reporting exceptional yields of spring wheat and canola this year, with many having a difficult time finding a place to store it all. Some farmers shipped out some of their grain early because they had to make room for more, says Doug Chorney, President of Keystone Agricultural Producers. The bountiful harvest is not over yet. Chorney said Manitobans planted a recordbreaking one million acres of soybeans this year, and most of that has yet to be harvested. Chorney also reported that he expects farm cash receipts this year to top the $4-billion to $4.5-billion mark. Warm, dry conditions across most of Manitoba in September allowed for excellent harvest progress. To date, reported spring wheat yields range from 30 to 85 bushels per acre, barley 60 to 140 bushels per acre, oats 85 to 180 bushels per acre, canola 15 to 65 bushels per acre, and edible beans yielding
up to 2,000 pounds per acre. Altona-based farm production advisor Dennis Lange says it was an excellent year for edible beans with many fields coming in at around the 2,000lb. range. The crops have grown well, and despite some issues, like white mould, the crops are yielding well. The first soybeans have also been harvested with early yield reports of 35 to 55 bushels per acre. A large grain corn crop is still waiting to be harvested as well. Most areas of Manitoba reported frost events on the mid-September weekend. To date, minimal damage to crops has been reported, but farmers continued to assess crops over a number of days. Seeding of winter wheat continued through most of the month across Manitoba. In Central and Eastern regions, some seeded acres have emerged. And recent rains and warm weather will be beneficial for germination. It is currently anticipated winter wheat acres will decrease from the previous year as a result of decreased avail-
ability of stubble prior to seeding deadlines, and good yields and quality of the 2013 spring wheat crop. In Central areas, livestock producers are working on Green feed and the cereal silage harvest. Haying continues with a number of producers trying to finish a second cut. Yields are expected to be average at best for most areas. Winter feed supplies will be inadequate for some producers. Pastures are browning in some areas and rain is needed to rejuvenate stands. Dugouts are full. In Eastern areas, winter feed supply status varies with hay at 5 - 10 percent surplus, 80 90 percent adequate and 5 10 percent inadequate; straw at 100 percent surplus, Green feed at 100 percent adequate and feed grains at 5 - 10 percent surplus, and 80 - 90 percent adequate. Pasture conditions in the region are rated as 60 percent good, 30 percent fair and 10 percent poor. Livestock water supply is rated at 100 percent adequate.
Manitoba Veterinarian Says Give Hog Farmers Choice By Harry Siemens The National Farm Animal Care Council’s Pig Code Development Committee is reviewing public comments on a proposed updated Pig Code of Practice with the intent of having it ready in early 2014. Dr. Tony Nikkel, the Director of veterinary services with the Progressive Group of Companies in Niverville, said the biggest concern producers have is the proposed mandatory conversion of sow barns designed for stall housing to loose housing by 2024. “There aren’t s lot of extra funds out there and certainly the banks aren’t willing to lend a whole lot of money to any pig producer in Canada, at least not at this point,” said Nikkel. “These sow farms are designed specifically for gestation stalls and so there’s a lot of these farms that would have to do some major renovating.” He said it is not only a matter of taking out the stalls and putting up pens. There are renovation costs and reduced production leaving the farm. Many of these pig flows require certain number of pigs produced from these sow herds. Reducing the pig flow from these farms short changes the whole chain downstream. When producers built the existing hog barns, they designed them specifically for gestation stalls designing the concrete, foundations, and buildings around these stalls. “If they convert it will cost them huge dollars, which within our group would be a very difficult burden to handle,” said Nikkel. “A number would not be able to fund these conversions because of the way they built their barns requiring some major, major renovating, not just taking out some stalls and putting up pens, but jack hammering out concrete, often with floor-heating systems.” “To amplify the problem there’s no additional revenue in producing these pigs from loose sow housing and so this is just a flat up straight cost the producer can never recover,” he said. Dr. Nikkel suggests that while requiring newly constructed barns to use group housing is reasonable, farmers with barns using stalls should be able to operate beyond 2024. He said people should remember the history dating back to the 70s and even earlier and the primary reason for going to them. Pig producers had safety concerns because penned up sows kept fighting amongst themselves. “To improve the welfare of those animals they thought better to segregate them either during breeding or post breeding periods to eliminate the fighting and improve their welfare,” Nikkel said. “That is where the gestation stalls came from. Pigs are inherently herd animals and have a definitive hierarchy they need to establish when in herds.” He said the herd needs to establish a dominant sow within a short period or they will fight their way to the top until a dominant sow emerges. The less dominant ones, the losers, get beat up quite badly in the process until the herd establishes that hierarchy. That is why the industry went to stalls to eliminate that fighting and resulting injuries. “I think to be pushing and forcing people into that setting because it is not nearly perfect is not right, it should be more a matter of choice for these producers,” he said. “While many of these producers may not be in actual trouble, they don’t have much extra cash, either. It is estimated that with limited jack hammering and concrete removal, farmers are looking at a cost of $500 per sow. Many hog facilities have 3,000 sows, which leaves farmers looking at $1.5 million to renovate. “They aren’t sitting on a $1.5 million waiting to be spent,” said Nikkel. “Banks won’t rush in to provide the money especially with the only potential being less production as a downside. Many producers can’t bear this major upheaval.”
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