Health Canada, which oversees the federal Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA), announced Monday evening it has authorized a “time-limited and controlled” emergency-use registration for the rodent poison for those two provinces, running until November 2027.

WHY IT MATTERS: Other pest controls are available for use against gophers but farmers find strychnine both more effective and easier to use.

The new decision follows the federal government’s cancellations of all registered uses of strychnine in recent years, and a joint application for the product’s emergency use filed by the two provinces’ agriculture ministries last October.

PMRA had rejected that joint application in February, saying its proposals “did not provide sufficient means to address the risks of concern identified in the re-evaluation that led to strychnine’s cancellation.”

The earlier cancellations had been based on an updated environmental risk assessment, which had found no “practical risk-reduction measures to protect non-target animals” if they fed on strychnine-poisoned pest or predator animal carcasses or directly on poisoned gopher bait.

However, Health Canada said Monday, the two provinces last week filed a revised joint emergency-use request which includes “additional restrictions and mitigations … to lower the environmental risk to an acceptable level.”

The “significant” added measures in the new plan include a “reduced geographical scope” and “revised product stewardship program,” among others, Health Canada said.

Since strychnine’s uses were cancelled, farmers and ranchers have been raising concerns about on-farm efficacy of other products still registered for use against gophers.

The temporary use of strychnine will help farmers address “multi-million dollars worth of damage” in various crops from a recent spike in populations of gophers, a.k.a. Richardson’s ground squirrels, Health Canada said Monday.

Health Canada noted the Prairies have been experiencing “abnormally dry conditions, which (affect) the sustainability and quality of farmlands and allowed the population of these gophers to increase significantly.”

Reaction so far

“Saskatchewan producers have been clear about the challenges they face in managing gophers with the limited tools currently available,” provincial Agriculture Minister David Marit said Monday in Health Canada’s release. “We’re pleased to see the emergency use request granted as a practical opportunity for producers to demonstrate how strychnine can help protect their crops and pastures from continued damage.”

“Alberta’s producers have faced significant challenges managing (gophers) and the loss of this control method was difficult and costly for many in the ag sector,” RJ Sigurdson, Alberta’s minister for agriculture and irrigation, said in the same release.

“I’m confident that, with this effective tool back in the hands of our producers, they will be able to better manage their operations and reduce excessive crop and grassland losses due to the overpopulation of (Richardson’s ground squirrels) throughout the Prairies.”

“Innovative and collaborative efforts by all levels of government are needed to support the domestic agriculture industry especially during this period of uncertainty,” federal Health Minister Marjorie Michel and Agriculture Minister Heath MacDonald said in the same release. “Our governments’ shared commitment of supporting Canadian farmers, our economy, and food security led us to work together to address a compounding threat.”

The post Saskatchewan, Alberta farmers get strychnine against gophers until late 2027 appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Whether it be wild boars for crops or the spectre of zebra mussels being the bane of irrigation districts, the Alberta Invasive Species Council are reminding farmers they are here to help.

Established in 2006 as a non-profit organization, AISC focuses on prevention, eradication, containment and mitigation strategies.

“The bottom line of a lot of this is we’re here to save people money. That’s a big part of invasive species. There’s a lot going on in Alberta. We have a lot of challenges,” said George Bloom, an invasive species biologist from the AISC, speaking at the 2026 Irrigated Crop Production Update in Lethbridge.

WHY IT MATTERS: Early detection and prevention of invasive species nets the highest rate of return for agricultural producers, rather than mitigation and containment.

Invasive species have an impact of over $2 billion on Alberta’s economy, affecting 1.3 per cent of GDP. They are the second biggest threat to global diversity and 60 per cent of global species extinctions have been caused solely, or in part due to invasive species. There are 44 species at risk in Canada, which listed invasive plants as factors in their at-risk status.

“We have some really interesting science to back up the effects of these invaders. A lot of the time we’re focused on mitigation and containment strategies, but the best dollar-for-dollar effect we have right now is me standing up here and saying, ‘Hey, if you see something weird, look it up,’” said Bloom.

Producers can use the Early Detection and Distribution Mapping System (EDDMapS), which is free to download on Android and iPhone. Users can take photos, provide GPS locations and send reports directly from the field. It includes identification tools for various invasive species. Verified reports are sent to local authorities for follow-up.

The Alberta Invasive Species Council looks at plants, vertebrates, invertebrates, mollusks and grasses. Invasive species like flowering rush, oxeye daisies, tall buttercup and zebra and quagga mussels can all affect irrigation systems if unchecked and uncontrolled.

ASIC has various initiatives currently ongoing including: Squeal on Pigs; Rat on Rats; guides on weeds, aquatic invasive species and tree pests; differentiating guides for the public between wild flowers and weeds; and Tank the Goldfish with Don’t Let It Loose campaigns.

ASIC is involved in various other projects, including boat wash stations around Edmonton, environmental DNA monitoring, bio-control research and testing out suction-based technology from Australia for speed production control.

Vectors that bring in invasive species can be numerous, be it cars, trucks, boats, wood packaging, firewood, recreational gear and international releases of horticulture and pets. Bloom unveiled recent incidences including an invasive plant from Australia brought to a store in Calgary in 2024 from a shipment of plants from Miami. In the summer 2025, a giant chocolate slug (Arion rufus) was brought in from the Okanagan where it has been established in British Columbia since the 1940s and are native to Europe.

If something looks off, Bloom encourages producers to record and report, and experts can sort things out later.

The post Invasive species council lending a helping hand to Alberta agricultural producers appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Macrosteles quadrilineatus injects a phytoplasma into the plant that affects its hormones; where you get green things where you should have yellow things in canola and you get leaves instead of seeds.

The leafhoppers spread aster yellows that affect over 300 plants including crops like canola, wheat and carrots as a generalist pest. Testing for leafhopper aster yellows infection using laboratory and field-adaptable DNA extraction has improved by leaps and bounds. Confirmation comes within a half-an-hour compared to a week previously.

WHY IT MATTERS: The speed at which Western Canadian pests can be identified and the conditions and best practices used in combating them are crucial in saving yields in various crops including canola.

“Where do the leafhoppers come from, and when they come in, how infected are they? This is the key to the outbreaks,” said Dr. Tyler Wist, a research scientist in field crop entomology during his Pest-Side Story presentation at the 2026 Irrigated Crop Production Update in Lethbridge, Alta.

“There are a few different hypotheses going around. One, they come all the way up from Texas. Two, they come up and they hang around in Nebraska, Kansas, and then they come up. Some years they don’t even get all the way to Canada on this northward (wind) migration.”

Aster yellows affect on canola yields seem to be linked to water/moisture levels according to some of Wist’s and his colleagues research. Wist showed graphs of big outbreaks in May 2012 and May 2023, with a wide variance of moisture levels at the time. The much drier season in 2023 resulted in less damage overall, backed by an 2015 Elliott/Olivier study of leafhopper feeding density with corresponding canola seed yield in dry and wet conditions.

“It was really hot and dry in 2023. The canola wasn’t as trashed as I expected. I was catching leafhoppers that were infected over 61 per cent of the population, which is completely unheard of for aster yellows hoppers coming up here,” said Wist.

A working hypothesis is with canola seed treated with insecticide, it kills the leaf hopper alongside the flea beetle. Under dry soil conditions, most of the leafhoppers died with 24 hours and did not affect the plants.

Under the wet soil conditions, only about half of the leafhoppers died with the rest remaining to hang around and feed on the plant.

Most conditions cut down on the impact of the insecticides by taking a lot out of the root zone, where the plant does not pick it up, allowing the leafhopper to survive longer as a vector and increasing the chance of aster yellows infestation.

“Aster yellows went down under these dry soil conditions in 2023. Things that didn’t have a seed treatment, like carrots, peas, sunflowers and the whole cut flower industry in northern Alberta were just absolutely hammered by aster yellows,” said Wist.

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What if, instead of blanket spraying an entire field to wipe out invading insects, you gave them something to munch on that you want them to eat?

Trap cropping — where plants favoured by a pest insect are planted to draw insects away from a main cash crop (usually planted later) — is making new inroads with farmers, particularly those with small to mid-sized fields and who want to lower insecticide use, according to Héctor Cárcamo, a senior research scientist at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada.

WHY IT MATTERS: Spray costs, resistance concerns and increasing awareness of beneficial insects have driven more research attention to integrated pest management practices. In some cases, that’s meant taking a leaf out of our grandparents’ book.

Speaking to pulse growers near Taber, Alta., in December, Cárcamo pointed to various Prairie research projects testing the concept in pest hot spots.

Trap cropping relies on the idea that, by concentrating pests in designated areas for food and egg laying, farmers can monitor and manage the pest population more efficiently. Maybe they can limit their spraying to that limited area, or release beneficial insects.

Spraying a smaller area might mean less input cost, while also keeping things friendlier for beneficial insects and making control efforts more targeted and precise.

Matchmaking pests and trap crops

The secret is finding which trap crop will draw the most pests away from the crop the farmer is trying to protect, Cárcamo said.

For faba bean growers, lygus bugs are one pest insect they’d like to keep well clear of their fields. They also might be enough of a picky eater for trap crops to work.

Cárcamo’s work into trap crops against lygus bugs was highlighted by the Western Producer last year. At that time, the researcher noted that the pulse crop’s timing — filling pods while surrounding crops are drying down — tends to puts a target on the still juicy faba bean plants for any lygus bugs in the area.

Researchers tried various trap crops as bait, along with targeted insecticide and beneficial predator release. They tried mustard, canola, hemp and sunflowers.

Winter peas got a good jump in development, while spring-planted peas faced struggled to achieve the needed difference in crop staging compared to the protected crop. Of the seven crops tested, one was the clear lygus bug favourite.

“I’ll give you a hint. It’s yellow flowers and produces oil. Canola was the clear favourite,” Cárcamo said.

Sunflowers also showed potential, echoing results also seen in China with a different species of lygus bug.

Last year’s coverage of Cárcamo’s lygus bug work also noted that faba beans planted next to safflower showed less damage than those planted next to canola in 2022, and that safflower seemed to retain the pest insects for longer.

How realistic is it?

There is promise in trap cropping fields, those listening to Cárcamo’s presentation heard. At the same time, results will vary depending on the pest and specific strategies used. There’s timing, field arrangement, pest pressure and follow-up management like local spraying and beneficials introduction that are critical.

In the faba bean trial, for instance, while canola had lygus bugs flocking to the trap, it also had to be followed up with well-timed insecticide to keep the bugs from exploding back into the protected crop.

There’s also the question of how well it meshes with the average farms. Most farms on the Prairies today are large, with large fields. More complex and time consuming agronomic pest management alternatives may not be attractive.

“Trap cropping, you need to do things at different times and some farms have thousands and thousands of acres. If someone has the time, maybe they are retiring and want to play around, then try trap crops,” said Cárcamo.

The post Trap crops to cut faba bean spraying? appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

The pests were first found in Lethbridge, but can now be found throughout the province.

“Historically, it was more of an economic issue in southern Alberta, but we do see higher populations in central Alberta and the Edmonton area. We’re still trying to tease apart the relationship between yield losses in central and northern Alberta,” said Jorgensen.

WHY IT MATTERS: With the right conditions, the pea leaf weevil can cause significant yield losses in pulse crops, especially field peas and faba beans.

Hector Carcamo, entomologist at Agriculture and Agri-food Canada in Lethbridge, said the pea leaf weevil made its way to the west coast in Canada in the 1930s, was discovered on the Canadian Prairies in the 1990s and has been moving east ever since.

This is the first year the pea leaf weevil has been a problem in Manitoba.

“We’ve seen a lot of damage in central Manitoba,” said Carcamo, at an Alberta Pulse Growers regional meeting in Taber.

Reproduction

The insects can feed on field peas, faba beans, lentils and beans, but can only reproduce on peas and faba beans.

The pea leaf weevil produces one generation per year.

Females lay about 1,000 to 1,500 eggs in the soil. The pea leaf weevil tends to have more of an impact on faba beans. However, there are fewer faba beans in the province, so the Alberta Agriculture and Irrigation, Plant and Bee Health Surveillance section staff concentrates their surveys on peas.

“Adults will feed on leaves, which is a nice way for us to scout for their presence, looking for those distinct notches. But that notching usually isn’t economic unless you have so many weevils that there’s not much plant left, which does not happen very often,” said Jorgensen.

The pea leaf weevils find areas with thick residue and perennial forage crops like alfalfa to spend the winter.

The weevils can overwinter as adult beetles and start feeding on non-reproductive plant hosts.

“That’s just an adult feeding. It’s not necessarily an economic concern,” said Jorgensen.

Weevils arrive early in pea fields in warm temperatures above 20 C. If the weather stays around that temperature for more than a few days in late April or early May, that may correspond with higher pea yield losses. If the weather is cool during the same period, pea yield is generally not as compromised.

New adults may emerge later in the growing season in late July through August, and search for any pulse crop to continue feeding before overwintering.

In March or April, they emerge from hibernation and start looking for any plant in the bean family to feed on before laying eggs from May through July.

“They really want to find the field peas and faba beans. There is something that gets them in a romantic mood when they find field peas and faba beans. They start thinking about mating and laying eggs,” said Carcamo.

“Even if they find alfalfa, they will not lay as many eggs in a field of alfalfa.”

Identification

The adult pea leaf weevil is slender, greyish brown and about five-millimetres long. They can be identified by the presence of three light-coloured stripes extending lengthwise down the thorax and the abdomen.

The larvae are C-shaped, light milky white in colour, with a dark brown head. They have no legs and are cylindrical, soft and fleshy. They are about 3.5 to 5.5 mm in length.

Economic loss

Weevils will move from alfalfa or another legume to a faba bean or pea field. They feed on faba beans and pea fields and start mating and laying eggs in the soil. The pupae emerge as adults towards the end of August and then start feeding on nodules, which causes the economic losses.

When larvae feed on root nodules, there is decreased nodulation, as well as a decrease in the amount of nitrogen that peas or faba beans are going to be able to produce.

“That’s really where our yield impact comes,” Jorgensen said.

“Sometimes the relationship between the number of weevils and the yield isn’t as clear cut, because of all the different agronomic factors that could impact the amount of nitrogen that’s already in the field. The amount of moisture the plant is getting is going to impact how that reduced ability to produce nitrogen is going to impact yield.”

Moving north

The pea leaf weevil has made its way to the Peace Country, and there is a hotspot in Saddle Hills County northwest of Grande Prairie. But there are still low levels of insects in that area.

“We did see a population increase, so we’re keeping an eye on it,” said Jorgensen.

The pea leaf weevil is most found in pea fields south of Highway 1, with density of the insect and resulting damage increasing towards Lethbridge.

“We recommend producers pay attention to what they’ve seen in their own fields in terms of yield impact, because this year, we saw high numbers of pea leaf weevil in the central and Edmonton area, but we don’t have any people reporting yield losses,” said Jorgensen.

Overwintering

The pea leaf weevil needs moisture to develop. They need a good snow cover or mild winter to survive.

“If we have a harsh, cold winter with low snow cover, then a lot of weevils are going to die over the winter, and if they don’t have the best moisture conditions over the summer, they will persist but won’t do as great,” said Jorgensen.

If moisture conditions are good, that will often help plants compensate for the damage.

Pest management

If producers see pea leaf weevil consistently in their area, seed treatments are the best solution, Jorgensen said.

“There are foliar insecticides that are registered for pea leaf weevil, but we’re finding more that they really do not decrease yield impacts from pea leaf weevil. Pea leaf weevil has a long emergence period for adults to be active.”

In areas that consistently have pea leaf weevil issues, using a registered seed treatment is one of the best things a grower can do.

Growers should keep track of yield issues and decide to see if treated seed is worthwhile for their farm.

“It’s worth noticing whether they have had any yield issues, and to make that decision whether using a treated seed is worthwhile for them specifically,” Jorgensen said.

The 2025 survey was conducted by Alberta Agriculture staff who stop at random pea fields and visit producers who have called. The survey for pea leaf weevil is conducted during the spring.

“We really appreciate the volunteers, because we have random sampling fields that we see driving by between the four and six node stage. It’s hard to track a pea field at that height, so we always appreciate people letting us know where we can find them,” they said.

The team surveys by counting the number of U-shaped notches on the leaves.

When the surveillance team has their information about what they saw in the spring last year, it’s still helpful for producers to make their own decisions about what they want to do in the field, they said.

The survey is helpful for making decisions, but it doesn’t necessarily reflect what will happen after overwintering conditions.

Unfortunately, pea leaf weevil is an insect that growers cannot spray for.

“There are foliar insecticides that are registered for pea leaf weevil, but we’re finding more and more that they do not decrease yield impacts from pea leaf weevil, because pea leaf weevil has a long emergence period for those adults to be active,” they said.

A foliar application is going to miss a good portion of adults, and they will still lay enough eggs that there could be a yield issue.

The post Growers urged to monitor for pea leaf weevil despite low 2025 activity appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Conservative MP John Barlow, who is the shadow minister for agriculture, called for the measure in a Thursday press release, saying populations of Richardson’s ground squirrels (gophers) have been out of control on farms and rural municipalities since the Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) cancelled the registration of the poison in 2020.

Why it matters: Richardson’s ground squirrels, or gophers, can cause significant damage to pastures and hayland.

The PMRA re-evaluated the pesticide and said it posed risks to non-target animals like birds. Bans on the sale, and eventually use of strychnine came in following years.

“Farmers and rural municipalities across the Prairies have been sounding the alarm about the devastating agricultural impacts of uncontrolled (gopher) populations,” said Barlow, via the release. “The loss of strychnine has led to widespread infestations, with municipalities reporting severe damage to cropland and pastureland.”

Recently, the Agricultural Producers Association of Saskatchewan (APAS) asked federal ministers to reinstate strychnine under emergency use provisions.

According to the statement, Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation paid $10.6 million in gopher-related claims in 2024.

Alternative products, such as zinc phosphide, exist for gopher control, but many say they aren’t as effective.

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The Government of Alberta launched a program this spring that allows ranchers to hunt problem elk. Eligible hunters can shoot cow elk on private property or Crown land, even after the February end to the recreational elk hunting season.

Cole Barten works on a cow/calf operation just south of Cardston, Alberta, and he’s seen the damage elk can cause.

“It was mostly just the destruction of fences and large groups of elk got into one of our stackyards and made a mess of a bunch of hay bales,” he said.

On the ranch where Barten works, animals are fed every day during the winter months.

“We don’t put down swath or do any bale grazing like a lot of producers, so we’re less impacted,” he said.

Barten, who is a delegate for Alberta Beef Producers (ABP), said this was the first year he’s seen elk damage in the three years he’s worked on the ranch.

“This year, we had close to 100 head of elk get into one of our stackyards,” he said. “And every day, we were chasing them out of it. They were breaking fences down because they are a large group of animals, ripping into hay bales and destroying hay bales that were for cows,” he said.

In addition to destroying stackyard fences, the elk destroyed perimeter fences and fences for calving.

“You get 100 elk jumping through that fence, and one of them eventually hits a wire and rips it out, and then the rest kind of just make that hole a little bigger,” he said.

Barten said elk problems vary from operation to operation. One of his neighbours does all the feeding close to their house, and the elk don’t go near the house, he said.

The ranch where Barten works is surrounded by grain land, native grasslands and Police Outpost Provincial Park.

He said it is impossible to pinpoint the monetary damage done by the elk.

“You have to factor in everything, from bales lost to fencing materials to time and labour dealing with it,” Barten said. “And it’s going to vary. For us, it’s thousands of dollars.”

He added the elk can be pests by chasing cows around and push them off feed.

“This one stackyard, where we had our issues, it’s in the middle of the field that we calve in. We had a bunch of newborn calves, and there was a storm, and the elk came and pushed all the calves out of the windbreaks and the shelters,” Barten said.

He’s excited about the problem elk program, also known as the wildlife responder program, because it gives ranchers another tool for dealing with them.

A problem animal can be a particular cow elk that is leading the herd into the stackyard, Barten said.

“She’s in the front, bringing the herd to the stackyard every time,” he said.

Once the elk herd hears a gunshot, and sees that lead cow elk die, they are less likely to come back to the area.

Barten stressed he does not have a problem with elk in general, adding that most people like to see wildlife on their ranches.

“I like having elk around,” he said. “I have young kids, so it’s really cool to go out in the spring and look for antlers getting shed and stuff like that.”

Kaley Segboer-Edge, stewardship lead and Verified Beef Production Plus coordinator for Alberta said the Alberta Beef Producers are following the issue closely.

“We’re following and engaging with government and stakeholders through a couple different ways,” she said.

Segboer-Edge and her team are using digital tools to follow the social media conversations and news.

“We engage actively with partners like the Alberta Conservation Association, Bow Hunters (The Alberta Bowhunters Association), as well as multiple departments within the government, including the Ministry of Environment and Protected Areas and the Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation,” Segboer-Edge said.

The group also engages with tourism, which is managed through the Ministry of Tourism and Sport.

“Our leadership team is really engaging with those ministries, especially in advocating for beef producers and the issues we are having. We’ve commissioned two major studies that are just kicking off right now,” she said.

One study will cover a jurisdictional scan of the western provinces, as well as some of the northwestern United States, to see how they’ve managed coexistence between ranchers and wildlife, with a focus on ungulates and predators.

ABP is also working with Canfax to understand the financial impact ungulates have on Albertan producers feeding cattle in the winter.

“From our preliminary look, there has been no major quantum research into the scale of the impact and winter feeding is just one piece where the ungulates are impacting producers,” Segboer-Edge said.

Hunting problem elk can also be a benefit to the public.

“It’s one of the major tools that we use for managing problem elk in our elk herds. Beef producers have a long-standing history in working with conservationists and the hunting community to manage our different wildlife populations,” she said.

Research has shown that hunting problem animals who are continuously coming back to the stockpiled feed can help disperse the herd.

“If you talk to any hunter or rancher, elk are a very smart species, so they quickly learn not to habitate those areas and rely on them as a food source,” Segboer-Edge explained.

Ruiping Luo, conservation specialist with the Alberta Wilderness Association, said the group isn’t particularly concerned about elk hunting.

“As far as we’re aware, that is sustainable if it’s managed in a way that is not threatening the population or the ecosystem,” she said.

“We are a little bit concerned because we feel that the government has been continuing to push what we understand to be its responsibility to manage these problem animals onto hunters,” Luo said.

Hunters don’t have the same background as wildlife officers, who should be managing these populations or problem animals, she said.

Luo added that the government hasn’t officially defined what counts as a problem animal.

“It’s usually in a conflict situation, although that too is unclear on what is considered a conflict,” she said.

Luo said it’s a controversial topic, but one way to manage elk populations is to allow some predator co-existence. Wolves and cougars can help control elk populations, because they change elk behaviour. If wolves and cougars are in the area, elk tend to spend less time feeding.

“They tend to be more hidden in the trees, because they don’t want to be at the risk of predation. I suppose a different concern we have is that the province recently seems to be going after a lot of these predators, and that might be impacting other organisms, including elk,” she said.

The post Alberta gives green light for problem elk hunting appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Agriculture Minister Devin Dreeshen announced a ministerial order Wednesday to remove Fusarium graminearum from the list of pests covered by the Pest and Nuisance Control Regulation, which is attached to the province’s Agricultural Pests Act.

Removing fusarium from the regulation “will allow Alberta to modernize to managing the disease, rather than having zero tolerance for it,” the province said in a release.

The fungal plant pathogen causes fusarium head blight (FHB), which impacts yield and grain quality and produces toxins in infected crops. In Canada it shows up mainly in wheat, barley and corn.

Known to damage crops in Eastern Canada at least as far back as the 1940s, fusarium was first spotted at low levels in Alberta in 1989, and the province responded to its spread in 2002 with its Fusarium graminearum Management Plan.

Since then, the province said, regulating fusarium “has failed to stop its spread” and the 2002 management plan “does not account for recent advances in seed treatment options that can lower detections, bringing them close to zero.”

“This long-overdue change creates new opportunities for our farmers by levelling the playing field,” Dreeshen said in Wednesday’s release, adding Alberta farmers “will benefit from current research advances” as a result.

“Fusarium is well-established in Alberta and since it spreads through airborne spores, we know that zero-tolerance policies are not effective,” Alberta Wheat Commission chair Todd Hames said in the same release, adding the regulatory change “better reflects the reality facing farmers.”

Canadian Seed Trade Association president Georges Chausse said the CSTA “has long advocated for a removal of fusarium as a pest as it will be the most effective way for industry to promote management systems; encourage research, investment and innovation; and allow Alberta farmers to stay competitive with their counterparts in other jurisdictions.”

Member organizations in the province’s fusarium working group had until now called for “extension and education of best management practices,” saying such an approach would “enable sustainable FHB mitigation.”

To that end, the province’s cereal crop commissions and the fusarium working group are now developing a website expected to serve as “a one-stop resource aimed at FHB mitigation.”

The website, titled “Let’s Manage It! – A farmer’s guide to mitigating and managing fusarium head blight in Alberta,” is expected to launch “in the coming days.”

“The ‘Let’s Manage It!’ website aligns with the government’s shift away from regulatory control and will help farmers take action,” Alberta Barley chair Dave Bishop said Wednesday in a separate release from the working group.

“FHB has become a challenge in all regions of Alberta, but we can control its spread by how we manage our operations. I know farmers will appreciate being able to find everything they need right at their fingertips to keep this disease at bay.”

“By shifting to a science-based collaborative effort to address fusarium, we can encourage industry investment in research and broaden our range of prevention and disease management techniques,” Alberta Seed Growers president Renee Hoyme said in the same release.

Plant diseases still listed as “pests” in the Pest and Nuisance Control Regulation include, among others, clubroot, blackleg, potato wart, Dutch elm disease, fireblight and head smut. –– Glacier FarmMedia Network

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The world’s largest retailer applied for six patents last year on drones that aim to prevent damage to crops, control pest attacks on farms and cross-pollinate plants, according to U.S. Patents and Trademark Office documents that were made public last week and seen by Reuters.

Groceries make up 56 per cent of the company’s total revenue and Walmart may see drone technology as one way to get food from farms to store shelves faster and more cheaply to compete with Amazon.com, following its purchase of Whole Foods Market last year and the expansion of discount chains like Aldi and Lidl.

In one application, Walmart seeks to patent a system that would use drones to identify crop-damaging pests and then dispense insecticides on the critters. Another suggests the use of drones carrying pollen dispensers to successfully pollinate crops.

Using technology to precisely apply pesticides rather than spraying entire fields can benefit the environment and save money for farmers. As part of a sustainability push in recent years, Walmart has also worked with suppliers to reduce the amount of fertilizer used to grow crops because it can pollute the environment.

Walmart spokeswoman Molly Blakeman said the company always looks for new ways to serve shoppers better but had no comment on the filings. The retailer applies for dozens of patents a year and many do not result in commercial products.

Walmart previously applied for a patent involving drones that could monitor crops’ growing conditions and send data to stores about when and from where produce might arrive, said Zoe Leavitt, a senior analyst from data intelligence firm CB Insights, which analyzes corporate patent filings.

The series of six applications indicates Walmart is looking into farming more seriously, she said.

Walmart has so far applied for 46 patents for using drone technology, mostly to facilitate its delivery and logistics operations, or for use within warehouses to do things such as track inventory, according to data from CB Insights.

In U.S. agriculture, drones are most often used to survey farms that can span hundreds of acres. The devices fly above fields and take photos that help growers estimate the size of upcoming harvests or identify problems, such as weed infestations and nutrient deficiencies.

Other industries have also turned to drones, with AT+T using the devices to look at cellphone towers in Texas last year after Hurricane Harvey. Insurers such as Allstate use them to assess property damage.

“The technology is very powerful and using that to control the supply chain as far out as possible will offer Walmart a distinct advantage over rivals,” said Bill Bishop, co-founder of retail consultancy Brick Meets Click.

The market for agricultural drones will top $1 billion by 2024, up from about $338 million in 2016, according to research firm Global Market Insights (all figures US$).

However, Walmart’s patent applications stand out because they indicate the company sees greater potential to address problems on farms, rather than simply spot them, said David Dvorak, CEO for Field of View, a U.S. company that sells drone camera systems.

“It sounds like Walmart is trying to develop a complete system that can actually do something about it,” Dvorak said.

The patent push involving agricultural technology harks back to McDonald Corp.’s efforts in the 1960s to patent the processing of potatoes into French fries so it could reliably deliver consistent quality fries at the lowest cost in massive volumes.

“Companies like Walmart for a long time have created sustainability initiatives and this is really where the rubber is meeting the road,” said Jayson Lusk, head of agricultural economics at Purdue University.

Such environmental-focused initiatives can be attractive to consumers, Lusk said. Eventually Walmart, which is courting more urban, higher-income and health-conscious shoppers for their online grocery business, could require suppliers to buy food from farmers who use agricultural technology to reduce chemicals to produce crops, he said.

“A way how this might come down is the imposition of standards on their suppliers,” Lusk said.

— Nandita Bose and Tom Polansek are Reuters reporters covering the U.S. retail sector from New York and agribusiness from Chicago respectively.

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The gopher problem is particularly bad this year, particularly in central and east-central Alberta.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” said Ian Murray, a cattle rancher who lives near Acme. “It’s absolutely astounding.”

Last year, the gophers flourished near Murray’s canola fields and in a couple of other areas, but this year, he’s surrounded by the pesky varmints.

“We’re been told that with proper grass management, if you leave the grass a little longer, it’s not as bad because gophers like to see what they’re doing.” said Murray, who is also chair of the Agricultural Research and Extension Council of Alberta.

“I have noticed that. For the most part, the stronger pastures do seem to have less.

“(But) if you get into the alleyways or places where the grass is substantially thinner, it’s almost like a river. The ground just kind of moves in front of you. They’re all over the place.”

Murray isn’t alone in his gopher woes.

“We anticipated it being pretty bad when it started out as an early dry spring,” said Phil Merrill, provincial rat and pest specialist with Alberta Agriculture and Forestry. “We knew that if weather conditions were conducive for gophers, we’d have a problem this year.”

If the weather is harsh when gophers first emerge, they have a hard time surviving and finding food, but this February and March were warm and dry.

“This year, it was really nice,” said Merrill. “All the ones that came out of hibernation did well and had big litters. Then it was nice and fairly dry, especially in the central part of the province in early spring. That triggered really good ground squirrel growth.”

Gopher tunnelling and burrows not only wreak havoc on productive land (and present a tripping danger for humans and horses), but also gobble up a lot of pasture.

“They’re taking a pretty good chunk of the grass,” said Murray. “We still have a lot out there, but we’d have an awful lot more if there wasn’t this gopher population pressure. The holes are another thing, and then the influx of badgers that have moved in to feast on the gophers so we’re dealing with that, too.”

There aren’t a lot of control methods for gophers. Murray has resorted to shooting them, but is aware of the public perception of this action. Poison also works, but Murray has concerns about it going through the food chain in his operation.

“Poison does work well, but to have the maximum effect, you have to have the poison out before the young are born,” said Merrill. “If you kill 70 per cent of the adults, you’re really killing the population. But if you kill 70 per cent of the population now, most of those that die will be juveniles that (already) have a high mortality rate.”

It’s actually too late to do much this year, but producers can plan for next year.

“If we have a damp cold spring, then we don’t have a gopher problem,” said Merrill. “We can’t anticipate that. The potential is going to be high for ground squirrels next year, but if the weather conditions coincide, then we don’t have a problem.”

Knowing the animals’ weakness also helps with control.

Gophers don’t like long grass, and will often move to areas with short vegetation, where it is easier for them to see predators.

“If there is a field that is not doing very well on a hill, then they’ll move into that area out of the crop where it is growing well,” said Merrill.

If headlands don’t have a lot of growth in early spring, the gophers will move into this area.

“They start in the headlands and if the headlands have very little vegetation, then they take off,” said Merrill.

Heavy fall grazing of pastures makes for low early spring vegetation cover which can increase gopher survival from predation. However, leaving old vegetation growth in spring pastures is not always economically viable, and is not a factor in gopher viability during a wet cold spring.

The post It’s not your imagination — there are more gophers this year appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.