Ag station open house, crop tour coming up

FORT FRANCES—The Emo Agricultural Research Station is holding its annual open house next Tuesday (July 22), followed by Rainy River District Soil and Crop Improvement Association’s crop tour on Wednesday (July 23).
Anyone interested is invited to come out and see what the research station is up to this summer, and get a first-hand look at the state of the crops.
Attendees will be treated to a variety of farmed crops, as well as get a glimpse of the new reed canary/switchgrass project involving AbitibiBowater, Rainy River Future Development Corp., and a handful of others.
This project is looking into the possibility of using these harvested grasses as fuels for the mill’s new bio-mass boiler nearing completion in Fort Frances.
Ag station co-ordinator Kim-Jo Bliss warned this is a really frustrating time because of the weather and its consequences.
“[The growing season this year] is much shorter—with the late spring you really don’t catch up on that,” she remarked.
“The heat at the beginning of the season is very important and you can never make it back because it is gone,” Bliss explained. “Right now we are all trying to make hay [but] with rain every day or every second day, it is pretty impossible to make dry hay.
“[Last] week has been kind of a miserable week and people are really getting down in the dumps.”
Despite the horrible weather and the delay to the start of the growing season, Bliss did report the seed will be of a much-higher quality because of this longer maturation period.
Normally by this time of year, the alfalfa already would be fully flowered. But she said they only recently have begun to even open due to the weather conditions.
“So if we get to make seed, it will be good quality with higher protein. It is just that the weather has to smarten up, and smarten up quickly, for that to happen.”
As well, though district residents have been complaining about the high amount of rain ruining their plans all of the time this summer, Bliss actually reported rainfall levels are below normal.
She explained it is due to the colder temperatures that it seems to be so damp.
With heat, the rainfall will dry up. But because the district has not been hit with the same heat as normal so far this year, the rain that does come sticks around much longer than it should.
In actuality, rainfall is below normal but affecting the crops greater than normal. This dichotomy of cold and damp is really keeping the grain crops at a sub-par level.
Bliss explained they have it set up at the ag station so that the water can get away from the planted crops much more quickly. But even so, the state of their barley indicates everything is still pretty miserable—even for them.
She noted their barley is looking pretty miserable and is affected much more quickly than the other grain crops.
“We need some heat and we need it more than just a couple of days a week,” Bliss stressed. “[This affects] the farmers, the agriculture industry, and everybody.”
The open house at the ag station, located on Highway 11/71 just west of Emo, gets underway at 7 p.m. on Tuesday.
Next Wednesday’s crop tour, featuring OMAFRA pasture specialist Jack Kyle, will begin at 10 a.m. at Bernie Zimmerman’s farm.
Everyone is welcome to attend.
For more information, call Bliss at 482-2354.
(Fort Frances Times)