Reading Time: 4 minutes A new youth academy at the University of Alberta aims to build on a longtime educator’s philosophy and give students a chance to get their hands dirty and feet wet. Frank Robinson started at the U of A in 1986, specializing in poultry production and physiology. He’s a longtime believer in “experiential” learning. To celebrate […] Read more
Youth academy to showcase agriculture, forestry and environment
Long-time educator Frank Robinson’s namesake academy will build on his legacy of experiential learning
Building a better canola with broccoli
Traits from related species may punch up canola diversity
Reading Time: 2 minutes There’s little doubt that canola is a powerhouse crop. Nationwide, it covered nearly 22.1 million acres last year, more than 99 per cent of it on the Prairies. The Canola Council of Canada puts its economic contribution at nearly $30 billion a year. A University of Alberta researcher, backed by the Natural Sciences and Engineering […] Read more
Plasma shows promise in grain decontamination
The fourth state of matter (in its cold form) could be coming to a malt house or feedlot near you
Reading Time: 3 minutes [UPDATED: June 4, 2024] Alberta researchers are harnessing a high-tech concept to decontaminate grain. The researchers are using cold plasma, which in this case was created by electrical discharge at atmospheric pressure. One of the most common uses is in florescent lighting, which creates light with little heat. Cold plasma is the fourth state of matter, […] Read more
Farmers and field trips provide something textbooks can’t offer
Reading Time: 3 minutes Linda Gorim’s goal for her agronomy students is to give them a hands-on experience. “My goal is to get them dirty, and I get them really dirty,” said Gorim, an assistant professor at the University of Alberta and the Western Grains Research Foundation chair in cropping systems. Her field crop agronomy course was created to […] Read more
Change is coming, but the options are many, say food experts
Forum on the future of food offers interesting takes on what’s coming down the road
Reading Time: 3 minutes What does the future of food look like? An eclectic panel of experts offered very different answers to that question at a recent forum hosted by the University of Alberta. How we grow food and even what we eat is probably going to change, but the solutions to today’s problems will require creative thinking and […] Read more
The door is open and young women should walk through it
That’s the message of Feed Your Future, an initiative aimed at showcasing ag career opportunities
Reading Time: 3 minutes What Kassi Rinas does for a living is commonplace, but the agronomist also represents the changing face of a sector where men once had all the leading roles. “My favourite part of the job is being a part of the farmer’s operation from crop planning all winter to putting seed in the ground, spraying it […] Read more
Lime shows promise for controlling clubroot in canola
The lime works by neutralizing the highly acidic soil preferred by clubroot, reducing the likelihood of spore germination and plant infection
Reading Time: 2 minutes Treating soil with lime could help farmers curtail clubroot infections in canola, new University of Alberta research suggests. Spot-treating soil with the mineral reduced the overall occurrence and severity of the disease by 35 to 91 per cent, growth experiments showed. The finding, published in the Canadian Journal of Plant Pathology, could give farmers an […] Read more
Wheat varieties could move from midge tolerance to midge resistance
Researchers are trying to isolate molecules that appear to transmit resistance to their neighbours
Reading Time: 2 minutes A group of western Canadian researchers is trying to create wheat strains with built-in resistance to wheat midge. Though midge-tolerant varieties are available, they are on a mission to add another layer of defence. “One thing biologists have noticed is there are certain varieties of wheat that, for whatever reason … where the midge will […] Read more
The search is on for the honeybee best suited to Alberta
Do bees born and raised here fare better over winter than their cousins reared in warmer climes?
Reading Time: 4 minutes Are honeybees raised in Alberta best suited to the province’s climate? That’s what researchers would love to find out. “There are increasingly bee breeders who are operating locally and quite innovatively to provide queens where they are needed,” said Olav Rueppell, a University of Alberta professor who is an expert in honeybee biology. “There might […] Read more
Canadian researchers crack the case of high-cadmium durum
The recent mapping of durum wheat genome has solved a mystery 30 years in the making — why some varieties are high in cadmium while others are low
Reading Time: 4 minutes Cadmium accumulation in Canadian durum has been a “solved problem” since 2005 — but now genomics have allowed researchers to finally understand why it was a problem in the first place. “It’s a really elegant story about how both breeding and the fundamental science of why cadmium moves in the durum plant actually came together […] Read more
Cyber-Savvy Farmer
