Thanks for tuning in to the Farmer Rapid Fire on RealAg Radio, brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada! Today on the show, your host Shaun Haney is joined by farmers Jay Lewis, Simon Ellis, Corey Loessin, Shaune Harty, and Pioneer agronomist Liam Bracken.
02:10 - Jay Lewis of Holstein, Ont.
15:58 - Simon Ellis of Wawanesa, Man.
26:31 - Corey Loessin of Radisson, Sask.
37:32 - Shaune Harty of Foremost, Alta.
49:55 - Pioneer Agronomist Liam Bracken
Thoughts on something we talked about on the show? Connect with host Shaun Haney atshaney@realagriculture.com, on X/Twitter by using the hashtag #RealAgRadio, or give us a shout on the response line, 1-855-776-6147.
On the Farmer Rapid Fire, we'll talk about the markets, we'll talk about crop conditions, how your livestock is doing. But today I also want to go in another direction. I want to think about food. Let's talk about food in a, in a week where we heard that Burger King is making serious inroads with consumers and overtaking Wendy's from a burger choice standpoint with, because of a number of recipe changes. There's lots of different burger options that are out there. 10 on the Farm Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada. We're going to ask the farmers about their crop conditions and how things are going, but also during harvest, their burger of choice. If you got to choose where you're going to go for a cheeseburger for that harvest dinner, where are you going and why? I'm sure there's some chain options. There's also some pretty good greasy spoon local options as well. We'll dig into that today on the Farmer Rapid Fire.
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It's time for RealAg Radio on Rural Radio Channel 147 on SiriusXM. RealAg Radio and RealAgriculture.com is your home for insight and analysis of the issues that are impacting your farm business. Let's get real and get connected with RealAg Radio. Welcome to RealAg Radio here on Rural Radio 147 SiriusXM. Shaun Haney, your host here on this Thursday edition of the show. It is the Farmer Rapid Fire here today brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada. They are celebrating 100 years of helping growers maximise yield potential. Contact your local Pioneer sales representative or visit pioneer.com/canada to learn more. Today we're going to be taking a quick trip across the country and trying to find out how farmers are making out as harvest is either here or is approaching. We're going to hear from Jay Lewis out of Ontario, Simon Ellis out of Walwanese, Manitoba. We've got Cory Leeson out of Saskatchewan, Shaun Hardie out of Alberta, and Liam Bracken is a Pioneer agronomist in Ontario. If you have any feedback on today's show, send me an email, shaney@realagriculture.com. Let's start off this week's Farmer Rapid Fire in Holstein, Ontario. We're talking to Jay Lewis. Hey Jay, how we doing?
Doing good, Terry, yourself?
Hey, pretty good. What's going on the farm this week?
We're out, just finished up our wheat crop and rye crop, and now we're putting some Last round of fungicide on some potatoes, preparing ourselves for the next round of harvest here in a few weeks. So yeah, it's getting things tidied up.
Yeah.
How's the weather been cooperating?
It's been a pretty nice summer really for us, and you couldn't really ask for— probably couldn't ask for much better really.
Okay, and so far what you've harvested, have the crop yields fall in line with that?
They've been pretty, they've been respectable, I guess. They're above crop insurance average or at crop insurance average, so sometimes that's not good enough, but it's all you can ask for sometimes. So the wheat was good. I'd say I classify the wheat as an above average crop for us this year, but our rye was, I would say, was below average.
Oh really? Okay, what led to that, do you think?
I think it was just a lack of rain. They did switch us varieties for our rye contract this year, so I'm not sure if that had anything to do with it, but the rye is— it was usually it's as good as our wheat. It wasn't quite as good as our wheat, but it's still, it's still pretty respectable, I think, when it all shakes out.
Straw yields are down.
Straw yields are down? for us in all our wheat and our rye. Like, we're probably off a bale and a half to 2 bales to the acre, but yields are the same. So we must have a lot bigger head, I guess, than what we had before. We don't shorten our straw or anything like that. So that part was good, but the wheat was good and it was all made great, reasonably strong quality, which is good.
Yeah. All the equipment so far in harvest been running smoothly?
Yeah, for the most part, yeah. You always gotta have a hiccup, like it's not even fun if you don't have a hiccup.
Yeah, you just—
there's got to be, there's got to be close to one disaster to happen.
So it wouldn't be farming without some sort of equipment disaster, somebody driving a bunch of hours to get a— pick up a part on a Saturday night, you know, those are— that's what harvest memories are made of, my friend.
Exactly what it is. Yeah, that makes it all— that's the storey you get to tell. Nobody tells the storey about the big day when you got it all done. It's the day that broke down and you had to drive for hours to get fixed and you still got something done. So yeah, those are the fun ones.
Yeah, that's, that's, it's, it, uh, the adversity builds strength.
That's for sure.
Well, we should be strong then.
We should be bulletproof at this point.
Should be, yeah.
Yeah, yeah. How about on the livestock side of the operation?
Yeah, it's good. Um, oh, it's good. I mean, cattle are feeding well and, uh, the lambs are doing okay. We're, we're working away trying to change a few things up to get a lot better performance out of our lambs, but, uh, we had a, we had a severe predation problem in our, in our lambs, in our lambing this year. Um, which is kind of took the wind out of the sail on that side of the, that side for a bit. But we did have a, a lot of predator problems.
Um, coyotes or what?
Ravens.
Ravens?
Yeah. Ravens.
Really?
Yeah.
And, and so what, what does a raven do to a sheep? It pecks at it? Like, how does it attack it?
Well, being on national radio, I don't want to say that— say what I think. I may condemn myself, but, um, they, they take their eyes out.
Really?
They kill them. They'll take the lambs or the— when they're there and they go— they went after all the newborn lambs and, uh, yeah, and we had like— usually you'll have 1 or 2 We've always had a bit of an issue with them, but we managed to keep them under control, but this year we could not keep it under control.
Okay.
I was throwing out dozens and dozens a day for a number of days. It was, uh—
And in Ontario, is there compensation for that?
Yeah, I believe so. Yeah, yeah.
You don't sound too excited about it. It's not—
Uh, well, it doesn't—
I'm not, I'm not excited about it because it's, I mean, it I mean, they are, they're a protected species. We're not allowed to shoot them, but that, you know, whatever. You don't farm for that, but there is a backfall to it, I guess, which helps you out, but, or covers your costs, but that's all it does is, that's like crop insurance. You never want to use it.
Yeah. Is the raven population increasing where this is becoming a bigger problem?
As for us, like we've never seen them to this level before. Yeah. We've had them. We've had a reasonably good— I better be careful, but we've had a reasonably good predator problem on our coyotes. There has been a couple of those, but we've, we've taken some measures to try to get rid of them. Like we graze all our lands in solar parks. So like your friend Chris.
Yeah.
We have solar farms as well. And And, uh, so they're in there and we thought we had them looked after, but the odd time the gate may get left open or they jump over the gate or under the gate or, um, but they've been good this year. Um, now tomorrow there's going to be a kill. I'll watch. I'll tell you on Friday, if you call me for Friday, I'll tell you there'll be a kill for sure.
Wow.
That's, that's too bad, man. That sucks.
Part of the business. We understand that.
So, yep.
Everything else has been like the lambs are growing well that are there and they seem to be doing well. Lamb market softened off quite a bit from what I see.
Yeah, yeah.
I'm not near as involved in that side of the lamb business as we used to be. So—
You said you were going to improve the performance of the lambs. You're speaking from like a rate of gain standpoint, or what are you talking about?
We were having some issues with our feed rations. And not having them balanced quite correctly and trying to, uh, trying to make our workload easy. But what we, what we were sacrificing on our work, um, or saving on our work, we were sacrificing on gains on the lambs. So we had to reformulate some rations and add some other, another little bit more workload into our day for making feed and delivering feed. So we had to change that up to make it a little more correct for us to help the lambs out.
So are you still feeling pretty optimistic about what's going on in the beef business?
Yeah.
Yeah.
I think, I think the cattle, the animals that I personally, the animals that I purchased with what's going on, I mean, I have to. So I, there's scepticism and I think we better be very careful on what we're buying going ahead. Yeah. We've got our, um, we have bought some cattle, uh, last 6 or 7 weeks ago there that are, are gonna be very, very tough. But I did say that a year ago and the year before that, 6 months before that, and they've, they're probably gonna all work, but it's, uh, we better be careful, I guess, is what I think. And there's just so many unknowns in the, in the ag industry that it's, It's pretty hard to, pretty hard to answer that question.
Yeah, I think, I think a lot of people are— what you described is, is what the challenge a lot of people are going through, right? There, there's some hesitancy on trying, you know, what do I do when prices are like this and inventory is so expensive? And what if I'm wrong right now and I deal with the consequences of that high, you know, it's Not— it's, you know, there's money in ranching right now, but you're— there's— people are being cautious, I think, because of how steep prices have become, right? They don't want to make the wrong decision now thinking that this lasts forever because it won't. But we know that the fundamentals show that this doesn't turn around fast. from a supply perspective at all. We had Brenda Grant from Canfax on the show earlier this week and she was talking about that. And so this is the business challenge that people are in right now. It's, it's, it's not easy.
It's pretty hard to be in and out of a business and make any money regardless of how you do it. So yeah, I mean, I don't know, I try to look at our livestock of the business the same way I look at growing my corn and my potatoes and soybeans. You know, if there are times when those guys aren't— where we're not going to make money and we have to ride, ride through it, or we have to change up our production, the way we produce our crops or produce our beef or our lamb to try to mitigate some of that risk and keep our feed costs without sacrificing performance. And same as growing crops, try to keep our— to maximise yield for the— the, the leanest amount of money spent. So, yeah, I don't know. We seem to be able to— you want to always work through it and try to structure it so it's probably, but it, it's, it's tight. All the profit that we've made in, in livestock, whether it's lambs or cattle in the last 12 or 14 months or 24 months, you put back in every time. So, yeah, it's, uh, it's a bit difficult, but it's, it's not a, it's not a new task to agriculture, I don't think.
Hey, hard-hitting question to end here before we go. I was reading a storey earlier this week that Burger King has really had a resurgence. It's even become a very nasty competitor to Wendy's. Curious, where's Jay Lewis's go-to place for a burger?
Is this a fat joke?
No, no, no. You could take it any way you want, but no, I'm— I, I don't care if you're overweight or underweight. I'm asking everybody the same question.
It's a flat out, uh, if you go to Burger King and then if you weren't sure, you drive to Wendy's after just to make sure you got them both covered at the same time. But Wendy's would be the first place.
Wendy's over like even any of the other options out there, like McDonald's or anything?
Oh, Wendy's over McDonald's. Wendy's over Burger King. Yeah.
Okay. Wendy's.
Wendy's.
Nice. Yeah, you like the triple bacon classic or something like that, or what are you going with?
Baconator. I don't, I don't want to make her too big. I can't, I just can't eat the, I can't eat the 3 patties anymore. I'm getting old.
Yeah, I'm right there with you, right there with you.
Just the Baconator.
Baconator's pretty good, my friend. Pretty good. Hey, Jay, thanks for joining us here today. All the best to you during the rest of harvest. Okay, we'll cheque in with you later. We'll be back here on RealAg Radio, brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada, right after this quick break. RealAg Radio is Canada's only daily radio show focused on agriculture. Get expert advice on Agronomic Monday. Tuesdays and Wednesdays, we'll cover a broad range of issues. Thursday, we'll hear from farmers across the country on the Farmer Rapid Fire, and we'll wrap things up Fridays with the RealAg Issues panel with Kelvin Heppner and Lyndsey Smith. Join us Monday through Friday at 4:30 Eastern, and don't forget about the replay at 7 in the morning on Rural Radio 147 SiriusXM.
Hi, I'm Lyndsey Smith. Joining me now is Michelle Wall with Syngenta.
When you think about seed treatments, you're thinking about getting your crop the best footing to make sure that all of the plants possible get out of the ground and lead you to that best yield. While your crop is still in the ground and you're starting to think about harvest, it's already a good time to be thinking about next spring. If we look at soybeans specifically, you want to make sure you get your seed treatments out there. It's a great year for us to be launching Victrado Complete, which has 4 active ingredients to control yield robbers: the Pythium, the Rhizoctonia, Fusarium, and Phytophthora. But there's also a new active ingredient called Timerium technology, and that's the part that's in Victrado II, and it'll help control soybean nematode and sudden death syndrome. So this gives you that all-in-one package that you don't have to worry about what your conditions are going to be in the spring because you know you've got all the boxes checked. Talk to either your SeedCare rep, your territory sales rep, and be sure to talk to your seed rep as well to make sure that your seeds are covered next year with the seed treatment of your choice.
Let's continue the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Seeds. Why don't we go to Wawanisa, Manitoba? We're talking to Simon Ellis. Simon, welcome to the show.
Thanks for having me, good to hear from you again.
Yeah, hey, how are things progressing here in the 2026 growing season? What's going on this week on the farm?
Well, I just did my first test of peas and they're not ready, they're 25% with lots of green. They've been sprayed with Reglon for 5 days, so we're gonna give them Maybe we'll test them Friday, we'll see. We like to get them at 18% so we reduce cracking, but we're a little ways away yet.
Is this a little bit late for peas or normal?
I think we're pretty late this year. Normally we'd be very start of August and like by now we should be well into wheat and oats and everything, but you know, it's been a wet season. The entire farm had some hail this year, so It kind of set everything back and we're dealing with a lot of in-crop variability on staging, so it's going to be an interesting season.
Which crop out in the field kind of looks the best, you're the most optimistic about?
The flax actually handled the hail the best, so we had a field of flax that was surrounded by wheat and canola and other things The wheat was 100% right off, there was nothing left, and the flax, they did 15% damage. And so the flax seemed to handle everything and it looks quite good right now.
Because the straw is like concrete.
Yeah, I wonder if it's not because it's kind of ropier or just a little more resilient that it was able to just kind of fold over and then spring back up.
Hey, so you've mentioned a number of different crops here. How many crops do you have this year on the farm?
This year we'll have wheat, oats, yellow peas, forage peas, soybeans, canola, and flax.
Okay, that's a healthy mix, man.
Try to go wide, rotation and get away from some disease issues, and we're also pedigreed seed growers, so having a wide rotation helps as far as that's concerned as well.
How does the canola look?
It looks quite good actually. We didn't have too much flea beetle pressure on the start of the season, had a bit of hail on it, but it seemed to bounce back after a couple weeks. It's just done flowering and it's filling pods right now, so as long as we don't get an early frost, I think the canola should be okay. I know some guys that had quite a lot of hail are a little on edge about just how soon the frost is going to come and whether their crop will make it, but it's had lots of moisture and the temperature has been pretty reasonable. So it looks optimistic here.
That's encouraging.
Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.
From a harvest perspective, I assume based on the lateness or the delay, you're all ready to go though, like as soon as that moisture is at the right spot, we're ramped up and Yep, you bet.
We're rolling.
Yeah, we're, uh, I'm still trying to figure out our bin organisation and all that sort of stuff, of course, and I don't know if I'm ever truly ready in typical fashion, but combine's ready, header works, and, you know, trucks are clean, ready to go. So hopefully as soon as the moisture hits the right spot, then we're rolling.
And you get that fun and frivolity as a seed grower of doing some combine cleanouts.
Absolutely.
Who doesn't love that? Like, come on, that's fun.
We have our big combine and we're ready to go. I invested in a full-face respirator, so it's got the whole shield right around my whole face and respirator this year, so I'm hoping that keeps the soybean fur out of my eyes this year because that stuff is itchy and sticks right in there. We're doing some upgrading.
There you go. Well, hey, you've got to have some nice comforts as well. Do you use water at all to clean out the combine, or are you just using air?
No, just air. My concern with water is that, you know, I miss a spot, now it's, you know, swollen and it rots, or, you know, does something I don't want it to.
Yeah, yeah.
So we try to avoid that as much as we can.
Okay, what kind of combines are you running?
We have a CX8090, so it's a New Holland.
Oh nice, how long you had that?
Since about 2018 or 2019. I know one of the first years was that 2019 year where we were combining in the rain and getting stuck and we were driving over sloughs that had 3 inches of ice on it and then we'd fall through and so it kind of put some hours on the combine in that year but it's, you know, it's been a good combine, it works.
Tyres or tracks on it?
It's tyres. We do have a set of duals that we can toss on if we need to.
Okay, yep, yep, okay. Any prep work for the '27 season? Have you picked up any fertiliser or anything like that?
I did, I bought my nitrogen, or maybe not all of it, but I bought maybe 80% of my nitrogen. I'm just, you know, the phosphorus prices are just crazy right now.
Yes, they are.
Kind of holding off. Maybe they'll get worse, but I kind of like, I think it was over $1,400 a tonne for what I was quoted, and I just thought, you know what, maybe I'll just wait, just kind of see what the markets bring, I guess.
Yeah, I think there's a lot of farmers that have done exactly what you just described. They've taken care of the nitrogen, they liked some of the price in that lull period, And they're holding off on the FOS purchase. That has been definitely the most common response I've got from producers, kind of going back to Ag in Motion mid-July period.
Yeah, I don't know, I haven't, I can't say that I've looked into why the price is so high, but really nice if they just found some extra production all of a sudden and could drop it. At least a couple hundred dollars a tonne just to get it back into somewhere reasonable.
Yeah, good luck.
No kidding, eh? Oh man.
Hey, I wanted to ask you, this week's question has to do with food. At harvest time, we're always a little bit hungry. What is your ideal place if you were going to go for a hamburger, cheeseburger? Where are you going?
Oh, I like to go, so there's a little drive-in in Wauneeza called the Garden View and they make a really nice burger, so that's, if I need a, you know, a burger and fries, that's, I zip into town, grab that and rip back to the combine and keep rolling.
What's good about it?
You know, it's an older couple who I think built it to give their grandkids a place to work Kind of an odd thing to do in your retirement, but hey, you know what, they cook a good burger, they're super friendly, they charge enough that you don't do tips necessarily.
Yeah.
And they have really good milkshakes.
Oh, okay. This is a whole secondary area. What is your favourite kind of milkshake?
You know, I'm pretty normal. I like a nice Vanilla milkshake.
You and me both, Simon. Absolutely. Team vanilla. Team vanilla.
Love it.
Absolutely. Used to do chocolate as a kid, but now I just, you know what, I've grown to appreciate the simplicity of a good vanilla milkshake.
Yeah.
I, you know what, all the vanilla haters zip it. Simon is correct. And that's what we're rolling with. We're team vanilla. Hey Simon, all the best to you with harvest. Hopefully that crop dries down and you can kind of get started and get rolling with what sounds like a pretty decent crop out in the field, and we'll talk to you a little bit later on as harvest goes on, okay?
You bet, sounds good.
Hey, great stuff. That's Simon Ellis out of Wawanisa, Manitoba. We're back with more of the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada. You're listening to RealAg Radio on Rural Radio 101.9.
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I'm Lyndsey Smith, host of The Agronomist, and I wanna thank you for tuning in for over 200 episodes of our beloved little programme. Join me Monday nights, 8:00 PM Eastern on YouTube for our live and interactive Agronomist Each week, our guest panel will handle some of your toughest agronomic questions live streaming on YouTube, Facebook, X, and RealAgriculture.com. Tune in Monday nights or go to RealAgriculture.com/agronomist and sign up for our email notifications and don't miss an episode.
Let's continue the Farmer Rapid Fire. This time, let's go to Radisson We're talking to Cory Lisen. Cory, how we doing?
Well, things are just going well, Shaun.
Nice.
I think pretty good. You know, we're already past the midpoint of August, which is incredibly hard to believe. We've got crop coming into the bin. I don't know, market's been, you know, well, okay, we want it to be better, but I don't know, I think things are going pretty good. How's harvest going over there?
I mean, we're kind of ready for harvest. Harvest isn't ready for us yet. Things are moving along, ripening now. I kind of think our lentil crop will likely be the first, but we're not quite at desiccation time yet. I'm thinking probably next week. It's hanging on pretty decently, I would say, and it looks quite good, and then some of the early wheat too is moving along, but I mean, it's from a distance looks fairly ripe, but when you get looking at the heads and stems, there's still green in there, so it's, you know, it's still a bit.
Yeah, I don't think you're alone. I have been hearing about this from other farmers on the Rapid Fire, I've been hearing about this through text messages and emails from the audience, There are certain areas where the crop is, you know, it was behind through the season. The heat that we had in certain points in July didn't push it back to normal. We're kind of later than— we're back to kind of how we felt a little bit behind compared to the beginning of the season.
Yeah, I mean, I haven't travelled around as much as I often do, but I have been around Saskatchewan a bit and There are areas that are still pretty late, like in particular some of the canola, it's got quite a ways to go yet, you know, for what are we at here, mid-August or past mid-August already.
Yeah.
And still, you know, very green fields. So yes, the crop has not caught up for the most part, at least from the areas I've seen, and ours hasn't. It's caught up some, but it's still not mature for sure. I'm hoping that by the end of August, we will be out of frost risk. Other than, yeah, our last seeded stuff, maybe not yet, but I think for the most part, if we can make it to the end of August, we'll be all right.
I want it noted, it was Cory that said the word Not me.
Well, I mean, don't misunderstand that I'm hoping for a verdict. I'm just preparing.
This is similar to baseball. We're watching a baseball game, the pitcher hasn't given up a hit, we don't just say, hey, he's like 2 innings away from a no-hitter. We just, we don't say the word. You said the word. I just, you know, I don't know, there's rules here and you may have broken an unwritten one. I'm just saying.
Well, sure, I mean, I still remember 2004 on August 19th, and so, yeah, which is kind of old history now, but it can happen.
Oh, let's hope not.
Let's hope not, yeah, yeah. There would be a lot of canola in trouble, canola in particular in trouble across this sort of black soil zone of Saskatchewan.
I agree.
For sure.
Yeah, I agree, I agree very much so. All the equipment's been running good though?
Oh yeah, I think so. I mean, we have it ready. We had a new combine last year, so, you know, not a lot to do. Did a little work on our header, but it's also fairly new, so ready to go, I think. I mean, grease trucks and that sort of stuff yet, but otherwise I think we're We're pretty prepared from the equipment standpoint. Yeah.
Yeah, did you—
have you picked up any fertiliser for next year?
When that dipped down there in July-ish, we bought half of the nitrogen. Half of it, well, it's a blend really, but half of what we anticipate needing next year. And then like a few days after that, It went up again, and so then I'm thinking, oh gosh, maybe we should have bought the whole works, but phosphate and sulphur are just stratosphere. So I don't know what's going to happen with that. I mean, yeah, and now nitrogen's back up some from the sort of the summer low, but yeah, that fertiliser is actually arriving on Monday here, so we've got to be prepared to unload that.
Oh, so you put— you're going to have it on farm? Oh yeah, nice.
And yeah, we are completely prepared to store 100% of what we need for next year and usually do.
Yeah, like, and we just were talking to Simon Ellis from Manitoba and he said the exact same thing that you just said. I think high majority of farmers have picked up some, they're in, and there's a lot of concern about P&S and the sulphur one I don't, and I'm no fertiliser expert, but the longer that Strait of Hormuz is closed or not open to its full extent, that's going to impact that sulphur price because sulphur is, that's a big thoroughfare for sulphur. So yeah, it's, I don't know, a lot of frustration about phosphate too.
Yeah, and it's quite related, right, because sulphur is needed in the processing of phosphate. So yeah, I don't know, and so, and what does, what does that matrix mean for canola acres next year, you know? Yeah, canola price is better, canola is still looking like the most profitable crop, but yet the fertiliser cost is going to be considerably higher, so yeah, it's a conundrum. I'm hoping, I'm hoping there's something changes before Well, before it's time, we have to buy the remainder and be prepared for next year.
What is interesting is that we released last week our July results for the Canadian Farmer Sentiment Index, and we saw a real sharp spike in sentiment towards financial situation 12 months from now, the industry over the next 12 months in general, Much more positivity around the industry in the next 5 years, willingness to invest capital. Like, there was some pretty sharp— still negative, but a doubling of some of the numbers that we were at, which I found kind of a little bit surprising. Are you sensing a step up in sentiment and optimism right now?
I think so.
I mean, I think yes, I would agree with that. Part of that is just, you know, it rains and things grow nice and driving around it looks good.
Yeah, yeah, okay.
Yeah, yeah, you know, that's way more uplifting than when it's dry early on and things aren't growing properly and, you know, the sort of potential is erased earlier in the season. Now, does that carry through to harvest? I mean, I don't know. Who knows, I still can't drive by a canola crop and guess the yield within, with any accuracy.
No.
But things look decent, right? So I think that's good. I mean, demand is strong for canola. We hauled a whole bunch of old crop in July and man, it was busy at the crushers.
Yeah.
So like, they were cranking it through, they're making money on it, but that's good. Yeah, demand is very strong, so what's going to change that? I don't know. I mean, it ought to continue, I think. Renewable fuel stuff in there. Yeah, so there's reason for optimism on the market part of it and reasonable optimism on the production part.
Yeah, it's good to see.
Oh yeah, it is, it is.
Curious to wrap up here, big question of the week. If you have— if you're in the mood during harvest for a burger, where are you going?
Oh, well, I say the local Red Bull.
Yeah, sorry, what's the local place called?
Red Bull.
The Red Bull.
The Red Bull. It's been here forever. I mean, ownership's changed a little bit, but they make— they have good food. It's right on Highway 16, so nice to be there. Yeah, yeah, any small sort of restaurant like that I think is sort of a good choice versus a chain burger place. Yeah, but yep, yeah, I'd go to the Red Bull.
Nice. Well, the Red Bull sounds fantastic. It sounds really good. Hey, Cory, thanks so much for joining us here today. Really appreciate it.
You bet, anytime, Shaun.
Talk to you later.
Great stuff. We'll be back with more of the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada here on Rural Radio 147 SiriusXM, back right after this.
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Up next, the Farmer Rapid Fire brought to you by Pioneer Seeds Canada. Let's go to Excalibur, Alberta, and we're talking to Shaun Hardy. Mr. Hardy, how are we doing?
Good, Shaun, how are you doing?
Well, I'm doing pretty good. I'm a little bit jealous you're out there running up and down the field in the combine. How are things working?
Good, you betcha.
Yeah, we've had a good start here and, and yeah, we're on the second full day of cutting durum and Got most of the lentils done, so yeah, it's been good.
How are yields?
Like, our durum here seems to be a little bit above average. I would say our durum's probably going to be in that 40 range, and the lentils were a little bit above average as well, so been pretty happy so far. I mean, same old storey I'm sure you've been told, we were set up for a a really, really good crop and then July hit and the intense heat and no rain, but it actually pulled through it not terrible, but could have been a lot better, but it could have been a lot worse.
Yeah, we're just like that one shot of rain away in July from it being a really good crop.
Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it would have been one of the top ones for sure. We were set up real good June. We had, I don't know, over 8 inches of rain down here, I think, and it was just a really beautiful start, but it was crazy how we just couldn't buy a rain in July.
Yeah, and did you have pretty intense heat when it came to July then too?
Yeah, we did. Yeah, yeah, not real windy heat, you know, not a lot of wind when it was so hot, but just, you know, there's probably 7 to 10 days there where it was, you know, unbearable, you know, it was 38-ish.
Yep.
So yeah, and then that really affected things. Yeah, hot enough, that's right, especially for a guy with my girth, you know.
What, you turn into a sweatball or what?
I had to ask the guys the one day, I'm like, is it humid or is it just me? And they're like, oh, it's just you.
Yeah, it's just you.
Oh, thanks guys, you're really helping me with my self-esteem issues here by, you know, it's not humid at all, it's just, Shaun, it's all you, buddy, I don't know what you're talking about.
It's actually quite cool out here, yeah.
Were you from, how many, are you guys running 1 combine or 2 combines?
We're running 3.
Oh, you're running 3?
Yeah.
Will you spend most of your time in that seat?
I will, yeah, yeah. We got some of the land we rented, the one landowner's running one combine and my one son's running one and my other son's trucking and I'm running a combine.
Nice, you've definitely got the pecking order established.
Yeah, that's right, yep, yep.
Listen, I've been here the longest, If I want to sit in that combine seat, I'm sitting in the combine seat.
And I'm not going to brag, but I am in the newest one.
Oh, you really established the pecking order. I like it. I like it. It's, it's, it's like, to me, that's my favourite operation. Like, in terms of all the things we do, I know some people love seeding time. I always really like— I enjoyed combining.
Yeah, I do too. You know, it's kind of brings everything from the season together and I don't know, you learn a lot sitting in the combine seat too about how the drill did and, you know, you kind of get ideas of next year as you're combining and yeah, definitely I enjoy it too, especially when it's a decent crop. So there's some years I didn't enjoy it so much, but this is a year that it's Yeah, it's fun and things are going and everybody's busy and yeah, it is, it's what you work for, right?
Well, it's all fun and games and it's enjoyable until you have to deal with a plugged combine, then it's not so fun.
No, that's not so fun, nope, nope, and that does happen. I don't want to, you know, say who, but it does happen, yeah, for sure.
Good stuff. You got some fertiliser taken care of for next year yet, or are you sitting on the sidelines?
I hate to even say it, I feel like I should have had some, but I've been on the sidelines so far. I don't know if that's right or wrong, but I don't know, inputs, man, that's the one that's— it's a tough one this year. Fuel is insane right now and Fertiliser, yeah, it's just at some point you can't pre-buy everything, right?
Yeah, we don't talk about the fuel cost enough.
Oh, terrible.
Yeah, just unbelievable. We're literally just buying hand to mouth, like what we need, just like, because everything we pre-bought's gone now and it's just, we're literally just taking what we need for like that week or whatever. We're not filling the big storage tanks because it's just crazy.
Yeah. This is, you know, with these kind of fuel prices, this is where we start to pay a little bit more attention to the fuel economics of, you know, a given tractor or combine. People start to pay more attention to it when we have prices like this.
Yeah, for sure.
Yeah, yeah, that makes a big difference. You definitely notice it.
Yeah, and I've had people tell me there can be real differences even inside the same class of combine across the brands.
Yeah.
People really notice a big difference.
Yeah, yeah, our one combine is a size smaller with a little smaller header and actually it seems to get really good fuel economy. I don't know if it's just the way it's matched but I think it's a lot of different reasons but yeah, for sure there's big differences.
Yeah, it's definitely trying to keep track of it. Do you track the fuel usage of all the different machines? Like do you do fuel logs and stuff like that or what do you guys do?
No, not really the independent machines, just kind of a total, like what we used at harvest and what we used at seeding. And when we went to the bigger drills and slowed down the ground speed and started covering, you know, more acres with more foot feed of drill and stuff, we really noticed a drop in usage. And same with combines, we went to bigger headers and, you know, a little bit bigger machines and the fuel usage dropped for sure, but just kind of total. Total operation, maybe, I guess, like each, you know, we do definitely look at seeding and say, well, this is how much fuel we use to put the crop in and whatever, right? And now harvest will be the same, but not, I'm not quite that detailed, but my accountant will attest to that.
Accountants always tell us what to do, aren't they?
Yeah, exactly, yeah.
Gotta do this, gotta do that, keep track of this, they're always, they're always all over us. Of the crops that you have in the mix, which one are you most— if you harvested the lentils, you're into the durum right now, you're cutting the durum, but if you look at the whole operation, which crop are you the most optimistic about?
Price-wise, definitely canola. Some of this land we rented, I think I've told you before, we had some chemfallow, so we threw some canola on the chemfallow, and that's probably our most optimistic side of things right now. I mean, this is a decent durum crop for our area, but I, yeah, I'm not real excited about the price part. Everything we did was really good, and, you know, we grew it and grew a nice quality crop, it looks like. But, uh, yeah, the probably the crop I'm most excited about is when we get into the canola.
Yeah, the price has been, you know, we had John Dreger from Left Field Commodity Research on the show on Wednesday, and we were looking at, you know, you look at the year-to-date, you look at the last 12 months. Canola has been a very strong performer, of course led by the soybean oil future, which is very biofuel related. Soybean crushers, canola crushers, they're definitely making money right now. There's a high demand for vegetable oil products, especially in the biofuel industry, and then that's worked its way back to demand from a farm perspective.
Right, yeah, so then it goes back to the diesel fuel I was complaining about earlier, it's probably helping the canola price, so it's kind of a give and take, isn't it, right?
There you go.
Definitely goes hand in hand, doesn't it?
Yeah, for sure.
That is true. Were you able to get away this summer at all?
A little bit, we did quite a few family things and then we have a camping spot out the local, spent some time out with the trailer there and stuff.
Nice.
Yeah, it's been good, did some fishing and Yeah, well, we were talking earlier about how your frame was having a hard time dealing with the heat. We'll stick along with that. If you, during harvest time, you need a cheeseburger, hamburger, where are you going?
If I needed that, if I have to choose, are you saying like which one do I think is the best one?
Yeah, where are you going?
Oh, where would I go? Oh, that's a good question.
There's some good ones.
Oh, I know there is. It's a tough question.
It is tough.
That's harder than when we were talking about canola, this burger question.
I don't know, where would I go?
Tino's in Medicine Hat, I would have to say. That's probably that drive-through in Medicine Hat. I'm going in on the number 3 there. That's probably the one I would go to.
They got some good milkshakes too?
They do, yeah. It's the total package.
There's nothing like a burger, fries, and a milkshake at some of those drive-throughs.
Yeah, it's a beauty. That one or Jimmy's in Bow Island there. I would do that one too.
Oh, Jimmy's in Bow Island.
Yeah, that's a good one too.
That is nice. What flavour of milkshake are you ordering?
I'm a strawberry guy.
Strawberry? I didn't see that coming.
No, you wouldn't.
Strawberry? Yeah, really? Yeah, okay, okay, I'll, I'll believe you. That's, that's, that's not— I'm not gonna knock the strawberry crew. I'm a vanilla guy myself, but, uh, yeah, to each his own, I guess.
Hey, Shaun, what would be number 2?
Uh, my number 2— whoo, number 2. I only order ever vanilla. Uh, you know what, I, I used— when I was a kid, I liked the blueberry milkshake. The trouble is the little fake blueberries get stuck in the straw and that becomes a bit of a problem. But yeah, I honestly like 9.9 times out of 10 would order vanilla.
Is that right?
Yeah.
I'm probably the same. Yeah, it's strawberry.
Yep, yep, yeah, yeah, yeah, gotta stick with what we like.
Yep.
Hey, Shaun, thanks so much for joining us here today on the Farm Wrap-Up. I really appreciate it and good luck in that combine seat.
Okay, thanks, Shaun. You bet.
Hey, we'll be back to finish up the Farmer Rapid Fire here, brought to you by Pioneer Seeds. Built on over 100 years of seed innovation and unwavering commitment to farmers, Pioneer 100 Series canola hybrids deliver a step change in yield performance and agronomic traits. This isn't just better canola, It's different canola. Pioneer 100 Series. Contact your local Pioneer sales representative or visit pioneer.com/100series to learn more today.
Hi, I'm Bernard Tobin, host of the Soybean School on RealAgriculture.com. Throughout the year on the Soybean School, we'll bring you timely agronomic video content from planting to harvest. Harvest, from the latest agronomic research to the latest in production technology. Cheque out our massive video library on YouTube, RealAgriculture.com, or download the audio podcast versions wherever you get your podcasts. The Soybean School is brought to you by Maizex Seeds and Lallemand Plant Care.
Okay, let's finish up the Farmer Rapid Fire today, brought to you by Pioneer Pioneer Seeds Canada, and we're going to talk to Pioneer agronomist Liam Bracken, who is based out of Eastern Ontario. How are we doing today, Liam?
I'm doing wonderful. How are you, Shaun?
I'm doing good, man. Hey, first time on the Farmer Rapid Fire.
Yeah, happy to be here.
Well, it's great to chat with you. Now, your area has received a tonne of rain, a lot of it. How has that impacted some of the crop conditions?
Well, it's, it's It's been certainly a big corn and bean year, one of those years you're driving by fields and just absolutely amazed seeing the growth and size of those canopies. It's been a little bit challenging, as I understand, with some of our canola producers and winter wheat, trying to get some winter wheat and also get some dry hay out of the fields, but overall been quite a nice change considering last year, we certainly aren't complaining about rain after the lack thereof from '25 in the geography.
For sure. Are you expecting some of these wet conditions are going to bring some disease issues in the corn and beans?
Yeah, certainly something we're keeping an eye on. Starting to see some white mould poke up, and I think too with some of the more higher yielding bean diseases that we're seeing, like soybean sudden death syndrome there. Those are some things that are becoming a little bit more prevalent that we're keeping an eye on. On the corn front, often keeping an eye on are some of our disease tracking models that we have at Pioneer. We're keeping an eye on specifically gibberella ear rot, northern corn leaf blight, and tar spot. Those have kind of moved into a little bit more risk and prevalence, and we'll expect probably to see some of these as conditions continue to develop for those diseases.
Yeah, and, you know, one of the decisions that comes to that corn crop is for some of our livestock producers that are cutting that corn for silage. It's that silage timing decision that is, is really important. It's critical.
Yeah, 100%. Certainly something that we're working through with our producers right now, straight from understanding what's gone on through the season and into 2025, what happened last year from and where we at from inventory levels is helping us give our customers a little bit better of an idea from a recommendation standpoint on things like chop height, you know, what inoculants to use if you're going in, if you need to start feeding feed. right away out of harvest, or maybe you're looking for something to try and harness a little bit more digestibility. There's some options there, but I think the big question we always get is just simply around harvest timing and corn silage and when, when is the best time to harvest. And something that we're trying to encourage, or I'm trying to encourage my customers, is to— if the crop is green and healthy, Let's try and leave it out until closer to 3/4 milk line. We know roughly when we get to that 3/4 milk line or further, we're still in a, in a stage where we can ensile the silage properly, and then we're maximising our starch off of that field while not having a whole negative effect on digestibility. So those are some of the things that we're considering this year with our producers.
Does an inoculant fit in all situations, or when do I use versus not use?
Certainly, I think an inoculant does fit in, in terms of any situation for a lot of our producers trying to maximise and retain all the energy and nutrients that you've pulled out of the field. We could reduce our shrink loss as well as it's somewhat of an insurance policy too if conditions aren't optimum for getting that silage out of the field, just to help make sure it gets fermented and is stable, keeping us all the way through into next year. We got to think about the feed that we need to feed our livestock all throughout the year.
You're trying to minimise some of the spoilage, right? We work so hard through the growing season to get the crop to, to this stage. We don't want— once we get into the pit or however we're ensiling it, we want to make sure that we take care of it and we give it the— we, we have as much of it as possible.
100%. And, and it goes back to a lot of just how well it goes into the, into the pile, into the silage pile or silage bunk. And that's where it comes back to proper harvest timing and and so forth too, which is something that we're working with our producers with our silage staging tool as well that we're talking about with a lot of folks.
Okay, where can I get my hand on that? Is there some resources there on the silage staging tool?
Yes, talk to your Pioneer sales rep. All it is about is we're tracking our local weather data and knowing our products, when to get the optimum timing for each of our products as they enter into that silage harvest window, getting into half milk line to 3/4 milk line. So yeah, certainly reach out to your Pioneer sales rep.
Okay, great stuff. Well, hey Liam, thanks for joining us here today on the Farmer Rapid Fire. Really appreciate it and look forward to our next chat.
Yeah, thanks.
Great stuff. Great Farmer Rapid Fire today. I really appreciate everybody stepping up during a Very busy time and making some time for RealAg Radio and making all this possible. Also, a huge shout out to Pioneer for being the exclusive sponsor of the Farmer Rapid Fire. You can find out more by going to pioneer.com/canada. If you have feedback on today's show, or maybe you want to provide us with your crop update and how harvest is progressing, send me an email, shaney@realagriculture.com. You can also call or text the RealAg feedback line, 855-776-6162.
Thanks, Peter.
Thanks so much for getting real and getting connected with RealAg Radio, and we'll chat again tomorrow. Cheers, everybody.