Over the short term, some of those external changes that have influenced decision making involve the tightening of rotations, weather variability and changes in the type and arrival of pests. There are also a host of new varieties with different susceptibilities that make a generic "spray by date" approach a thing of the past.

SEE MORE WHEAT SCHOOL.

This episode of the Wheat School looks at the new realities affecting fungicide decisions. Richard Marsh of Syngenta talks about changes in the area of fungicides from economics to application methods and spray timing.

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Farmers in SE and central Saskatchewan have really had to learn how to manage the moisture conditions.  One of the ways to manage the high moisture levels is through winter crops.  Kevin plants a good amount of winter triticale to spread out the seeding and harvest schedule and more importantly soak up the moisture in the soil.

Kevin's comments about his seeding progress is below:

Tad wet in the field. We pre worked most of our fields this spring trying to dry them out. Last fall we seeded 1/4 of our acres to Fridge Forage Winter Triticale. We started seeding on May 18th, and seeded 2 new RR2 soybeans, TH 32004Y2R AND TH 33003Y2R. Then moved into 29002. We got over 400 acres in. Also got 4 acres of MZ1272R grain corn in as a trial, as well as 4 acres of azuki beans to see if they will mature here.

Now we got over 2" of rain over the last 3 days so we will be off the land for another 4 days, minimum. It will be getting late for canola, in order to have it mature and harvested to get more Fridge into the ground, so will switch to more soybeans and cover crop (Crown Millet and Tillage Radish®). Fields are now flirting near the saturation level. Acres south of us may not to all acres again. Would estimate 40 to 45% done seeding. Time to spray winter cereals and do some tissue sampling.

If you have any photos or video from your farm this summer we would love to post them to show all our readers and viewers how the crops are progressing.  If you want more agronomic information check out the Wheat School, Corn School or Soybean School.

Depending on the herbicide you use, that decision to spray has a few qualifiers attached to it. The main qualifier being the restrictions on spraying based on leaf staging. Most herbicides won't allow you to spray past the four leaf stage.

CATCH UP ON CORN SCHOOL EPISODES.

In this episode of the Corn School, Mike Cowbrough of OMAFRA takes viewers through the definition of the four leaf stage, how to properly gauge weed pressure and why a 3 to 5 day window is so critical in spraying.

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CATCH UP ON WHEAT SCHOOL.

Kelly Turkington is a Research Scientist with Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada and an expert in fusarium. We spoke to Kelly about the three steps to effective fusarium management at the Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada Research Facility in Lacombe, Alberta.

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It really seems though that farmers and market analysts are scratching their heads with what direction each of the major commodities my move this summer.  Corn, Soybeans, Wheat and Canola all have justifications to go up or down or both through the summer months.

I spoke to Jon Driedger of Farmlink Marketing Solutions to get his impressions and thoughts on the ag commodity complex for the summer months.

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SEE MORE SOYBEAN SCHOOL.

OMAFRA Weed Management Specialist Mike Cowbrough provides Soybean School viewers with a closer look at soil applied herbicides and checks out what producers are doing to ensure they have some measure of effective weed control.

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With many corn stands in Ontario looking fabulous, the weather challenges in the southern tip of the province have been a real issue.   The photos in this RealCropUpdate were submitted by Philip Shaw, a farmer in Dresden, Ontario.

In early May, north of Dresden and Wallaceburg, Ontario received between 1.4 and 4 inches which tormented the planted corn.  This past Monday Philip received an additional 1.1 inches which has the corn underwater in some fields as you can see in above right photo.  This has forced some corn to re-planted in the area which is less than ideal due to the shortage of the premium hybrids with the seed shortage.  Not only are these farmers replanting but they are also doing so with older hybrid corn hybrids.  While the majority of the province is looking for some moisture, Dresden and area are searching for some drier days.

HEAR DREW LERNER'S ONTARIO WEATHER FORECAST

The soybeans have not emerged yet in the Dresden area but Philip commented that there will be some re-planting due to the high amounts of soil moisture.

On the left you can see the giant ragweed that was present in the field before it was sprayed with 2,4-D Ester, Valtera and Roundup.  In the right photo you can see how effective the tank mix was.  The ragweed was sprayed on May 14th and it appears to be controlled and taken care of.

If you have any photos or video from your farm this summer we would love to post them to show all our readers and viewers how the crops are progressing.  If you want more agronomic information check out the Wheat School, Corn School or Soybean School.

SEE MORE CORN SCHOOL EPISODES.

In this episode of the Corn School OMAFRA Weed Management Specialist Mike Cowbrough takes us through the scouting and evaluation of a corn crop to determine the effectiveness of soil applied herbicide and how to know when it's time to take other steps to control your weeds.

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But now we have a problem.....

The current seed treatments control the crucifer flea beetle and not the striped flea beetle.  This is a big deal.  

The striped flea beetle has been showing up in different parts of Western Canada, and farmers need to be scouting more and identifying which flea beetle is chewing on their crop.   If above the threshold, an insecticide application is required to control the striped flea beetle.  

In this episode of the Canola School, Troy Prosofsky, Canola Council of Canada walks us through the flea beetle identification with some great close ups in a field near Nobleford, Alberta. 

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SEE MORE REALWEATHERWATCH EPISODES.

Drew Lerner of World Weather Inc. helps provide a little insight with regard to that question in this episode of the RealWeatherWatch. We asked Drew what the moisture patterns look like this summer and if producers can count on those timely rains to keep things rolling through to harvest.

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