April is fooling around with some less than desirable weather. I was afraid when it started Sunday night it was going to snow all week long. Though we have heavy cloud today so far we don’t have the precipitation. It is always tricky because the cattle want dry bedding, but do you bother putting it out when you know that it isn’t going to last very long? With the current weather forecast we decided to move the sheep inside to avoid a mishap. They likely won’t do anything until after the weekend but this way they are safe in the barn. It is also better for my mom that will be doing most of the watching while I am at work.
We had a good meeting in Guelph last week and my flight back home was much better than my flight to Toronto. They had wet snow the first day, but the difference is they don’t have any snow left over from winter like we do. When I was leaving it was back to spring again. We had a jam-packed meeting with lots of work to do in this upcoming year. Though both the Provincial and Federal Budgets has some great things in them regarding Agriculture the one thing we are still missing is a fully funded Risk Management Program. A fully functioning RMP program would help rebuild our cow numbers and allow a young producer to get into the industry. If you are interested in joining the RMP program now is the time. The deadline to enrol is April 15. I have been promoting this program and feel it is worth you while to enrol. If you would like more information on it, you can reach out to Agricorp or join in on the information webinar that is happening this Thursday 6:30 p.m. The link to join in is found on the Beef Farmers of Ontario website or reach out to me and I will forward it to you.
Now that we have arrived in April, we are preparing for our Spring Cattle Sale on April 29. James our Sales Barn Manager has been travelling around trying to get an idea of what to expect at the sale. If you have animals that you are planning to bring, please let him know. This really helps with buyers booking transportation and orders. Trucking is tight these days, so they appreciate having some solid head numbers.
My boss and I completed our student interviews last week and it looks like we will have an all girls team again this year. The girls will start on May 1 and I look forward to another great summer. We are hoping that we will be getting some further tile drainage work completed again so we may to lay out our trials a bit differently so we can work around the project. I am also hoping that Soil & Crop and I can choose a date quickly for the summer tour since we have some special guests wanting to attend from the University of Guelph. We are expecting a couple of new pieces of equipment as well or at least new to us! Stay tuned and I will share that with you.
Wishing everyone a wonderful Easter weekend. My teenage nieces are expecting another Easter Hunt, so I must prepare for that. This isn’t the first Easter that me and the bunny must work around snowbanks either.
