Agronomist Notes

I spent last week finishing up client visits and dodging unexpected wet areas while soil sampling. In my territory, soil moisture ranges from 1.5 inches in the east and 2.5 inches in the west. I’ve found next to no frost in the ground between Calgary and Drumheller. I measured soil temperatures from a low of 5.8 degrees to a whopping 11 degrees Celsius at a three-inch depth. Surprisingly warm! There’s snow and rain in the forecast and our soils should have no trouble absorbing it. 

This week, we’ll discuss high and low risk seeding strategies. Next, I’ll give you an update on glyphosate salt formulations and list which products can be mixed together. I’ll answer some practical questions on glyphosate use to get you primed for the pre-burn season. Bruce Love will give his weekly carbon market update and we’ll follow that with fundamental and technical grain market news. Have a great week.   

Pictured above is a CAT 875T hitched to a 70-foot Flexicoil, Hi Heat Farms, April 18, 2009.    

Agronomy

High and low risk seeding decisions this week

With snow and rain in the forecast for Thursday, many producers are choosing to wait for the system to pass before they begin seeding. I have to agree with their decision. What's different about this year is the warm temperatures and moist soil conditions this early. You stick a seed in the ground on Tuesday and it would germinate by Thursday. So, the biggest risk to the seed would be cold temperature stress caused by a rapid cooling of the soil. Plants that undergo cold temperature stress can experience reduced seedling vigour, poor emergence and yield potential. In some instances, cold stress can even reduce a plants ability to metabolize herbicides later on. Our goal should be to reduce as many stresses as possible throughout the entire growing season including seeding.

If you simply must get something in the ground now, then seeding peas would be a low risk strategy compared to wheat, barley or canola. Peas contain roughly eight pounds of phosphorus per bushel and have plenty of energy stored inside each seed. Also, peas take more time to imbibe water and germinate which is unlikely to occur before Thursday’s snow storm. Seeds are most at risk to cold temperature stress and reduced vigour after they’ve germinated.

Given our warm soil temperatures, wheat, barley and canola could germinate within three days, begin to set root and be subject to cold temperature stress if soil temps fall well below zero. If you must be seeding cereals or oilseeds at this time, be sure to:

1. Seed place as much phosphorus and potassium as safely possible. With P and K diffusion and solubility slowing rapidly in cold soils, you’ll need these nutrients as close to the seed as possible to improve emergence.
2. Stick to cereals with high kernel weights like barley and some wheat varieties like CDC Go, which have thousand kernel weights over 40 grams and plenty of energy stored inside each kernel.
3. Use seed with germination and vigour levels well above 90%.
4. Do not seed more than ¾” to 1” deep.
5. Increase seeding rates by 5 to 10% if you suspect a long period (5 to 7 days) of cold soil temperatures.  SL

2009 Glyphosate Update

Every year the glyphosate market gets more complicated as new salt formulations are introduced and old products are more concentrated. I’ve put together a glyphosate comparison sheet you can carry in the tractor or water truck that identifies the product name, salt formulation, company, glyphosate acid equivalent and one litre equivalent. 

Important Reminders:

• The first rule of thumb is to only mix glyphosate products that contain the same salt formulations.
• You can top up Pre-Pass with any of the isopropylamine salt products like Vantage Plus Max, Credit 45, Credit, Glyphos and Maverick II.
• Do not mix potassium salts (Monsanto products) with diammonium salts (Touchdown IQ)
• Monsanto does not support the mixing of Touchdown Total and its products, even though they both offer Potassium salt based glyphosate products.
• Diamethylamine salts (Vantage Plus Max II, Maverick II) can be mixed with isopropylamine salts. SL

Sources:
http://www.monsanto.ca/_pdfs/eblast/gk_10feb09.pdf
http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/faq8069

Practical Questions on Glyphosate Use

How long do I have to wait to seed after I spray Glyphosate?

If you are targeting annual weeds like stinkweed, volunteer canola, cleavers, flixweed, kochia and wild buckwheat then seeding the same day is fine. Does that mean seeding 1 hour or 12 hours after you spray? Remember that annual weeds have very small root systems so it doesn't take very long to get the glyphosate into the plant. Spraying early afternoon and seeding early evening is fine.

If you are targeting perennial weeds like dandelion, quackgrass and Canada thistle then, ideally, you should wait 3 days before seeding. If weather conditions are good (no frost) and 15-20°C days then you can push the envelope to 2 days before seeding while understanding the risk and guarantees that are foregone by spraying earlier than recommended. The longer you wait the better.

If a frost occurs, can I still spray Glyphosate?

Frost is always a problem in the early part of spring. Often temperatures will reach a low of -2 to -3°C, and then peak the following day to 13 - 20°C.

Hard Frost (roughly -2 to -3°C for an extended period of time, window scraping in the morning)
Perennials: Wait until the warm part of the next day to spray. Wait 24 hours.
Annuals: Wait until the warm part of the same day to spray. Wait until daytime temps have reached 10°C for at least 2 hours before spaying. If frost damage is suspected wait 1-2 days to ensure that the weeds recover (they need to be at least 60% green).

Light Frost (temperatures dip briefly below 0°C overnight)
Perennials & Annuals: Wait until the warm part of the same day to spray.
Minimum daytime temperatures should be at least 10°C.

Weeds in order of frost tolerance:

1. Dandelion
2. Winter annuals
3. Quackgrass
4. Perennial Sow Thistle
5. Canada Thistle
6. Toadflax
7. Annuals

Source: Syngenta and Monsanto

What is your Carbon Plan?

April 20, 2009- Having a plan and a basic understanding of the carbon market are essential to any well managed business today. The carbon market may only be in its very early days, but it appears that it’s here to stay for some time. For agriculture, this could be viewed as another crop type or revenue stream to be managed and marketed in a way that optimizes returns and plans for the future.

The Alberta carbon market is only approaching its second year anniversary and a multitude of new Green House Gas (GHG) offset protocols are being considered, new ones have been added, and we are talking about a Federal and possibly a continental carbon market. Within this context, how do we ignore the potential implications of our management decisions? For comparison purposes, does a farmer today not consider what crops to grow, when to market them, and at what prices. So if we look at carbon opportunities on the farm, why would a farmer not consider carbon a lot like a crop that stores well and take the time to understand what this new market has to offer?

Following our crop example, the Alberta GHG offset system established 2002 as a start year giving many farms the opportunity to have a significant amount of carbon in the bin. Unfortunately, many farmers seized what they thought was an immediate opportunity to get some cash from a found opportunity. Sort of like storing a number of years of flaxseed crops and deciding to sell all of it on the assumption that the market for flaxseed was about to disappear. So if the market is not about to disappear, and it’s our assumption it won’t, why not consider a rational approach to planning your carbon opportunity?

This starts with some basic education on the marketplace and the products or crops in question. Like any education there is a cost, both in time and hard learned lessons. By taking some time to understand that your carbon credits originate with management decisions and how these decisions are measured, you are well on your way. Next is selecting the aggregator firm to work with and the kind of regular information and education they provide. This can be of tremendous value particularly as you start your education. Of course, there is the hard way which may appear easy at first. This often appears with the aggregator that makes it easy to sign up and sell without consideration for strategic pricing and education of the farmer.  This maybe just what some farmers want. Again, this is sort of like a farmer that produces a particular crop and is not interested in who wants it or why, nor what it may actually be worth in the future, and what is important to create future opportunities from it. I’ll bet that not many farmers would want to consider themselves in this group.

GHG Policy Watch

GHG policy in the US marches on with several important announcements that create even more momentum behind the proposed climate change bill in the House of Representatives. Last week President Obama announced a clean energy and climate change pack with Mexico, setting the stage for a NAFTA like region for GHG policy, or at least the south half. Also late last week, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced its findings that “green house gases pose a danger to human health,” setting the stage for the EPA to regulate GHGs under the Clean Air Act. This is particularly important since it creates the authority for the administration to move ahead and unilaterally regulate GHGs if Congress fails to deliver acceptable GHG policy later this year. While practically no one wants to have the EPA regulate GHGs; it does give the President considerable leverage to move GHG policy along.

The Canadian Federal Government continues to limit its comments to nothing more than having to likely create GHG policy that avoids retaliatory trade action from the US. In particular, comments from senior regulators and politicians in the US have them potentially imposing import tariffs on products that do not meet the same carbon standards as they do. In other words, the US is warning us that if we do not adopt comparable GHG reductions, Canadian exports to the US could face a carbon import tariff. Preferred Carbon’s analysis of Canada adopting similar targets to those proposed in the US would impose significantly more GHG reductions than those currently being considered.  

Alberta Market Update

Demand for Alberta based good-for-compliance offsets remains relatively strong even after the close of the 2008 true up period. A survey of market sources has these offsets with buyer interest in the range of $10 to $13 per tonne.

Reference: Bruce Love, Preferred Carbon
Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are those of the author only and are not intended to represent financial advice.

Market News

Fundamental Analysis

World Production in Million Metric Tonnes

	Production			Ending Stocks			Ending Stocks
	2007-08	Apr-09	Change	2007-08	Apr-09	Change	5 Year Avg
Rapeseed	48.4	57.9	20%	3	6.3	103%	4.6
Barley	133.2	153.8	15%	18	30.1	66%	25.7
Wheat	610.6	682.0	12%	119	158.1	33%	138.6
Corn	792.3	786.4	-1%	128	143.3	12%	125.9
Soybeans	220.9	218.7	-1%	53	45.8	-14%	54

Technical Indicators

I have set up these weekly updates to include market entry indicators to help you improve the timing of your grain marketing. Also, I added market trend indicators to give you a sense of the short and long term market trends.

Canola – November Futures
Insert chart
Wheat – December Futures
Insert chart
Barley – July Futures
Insert chart
Canadian Dollar – July futures
Insert chart

International Crop Weather News

United States: In the West, rain and snow showers are spreading across areas from the Pacific Northwest to the northern Rockies, while mild, dry weather favors fieldwork and crop development in California and the Southwest. On the Plains, a chilly rain is ending across east-central portions of the region. Meanwhile, the Red River of the North and several tributaries are again on the rise, following a mild weekend that melted much of the remaining snow. Farther south, producers across the southern half of the Plains continue to monitor the effects of early-April freezes on winter wheat. In the Corn Belt, rain is further delaying the onset of most spring fieldwork. Currently, some of the heaviest rain is falling across northern Illinois. In the South, torrential rain is returning to already soggy portions of Alabama, Georgia, and northern Florida, but unfavorably dry conditions persist across Florida’s peninsula.

Europe: Warm, sunny weather in central and eastern Europe promotes small grain and sugarbeet planting and winter crop development. Winter wheat and rapeseed breaks dormancy in Poland and the Baltics. Showers across southwestern Europe provide supplemental moisture for irrigated winter wheat.

Former Soviet Union: In Ukraine and Belarus, unseasonably mild, dry weather spurs widespread greening of winter grains and allows spring grain planting to accelerate. In Russia, cooler weather slows winter grain greening in the south and snow melt in the north.

Southeast Asia: Heavy showers cause localized flooding in Malaysia and Indonesia and slow oil palm harvesting. Showers benefit vegetative corn in Thailand.

East Asia: Warm weather promotes the development of irrigated winter wheat and winter rapeseed, in or nearing reproduction.

South Asia: Strong thunderstorms in northern portions of India and Pakistan hamper wheat harvesting and likely cause localized lodging. Seasonable showers in northeastern India provide additional moisture for rice. In southern India, mostly sunny skies favor rice and groundnut harvesting.

Middle East: Locally heavy rain in southern Iran increases irrigation supplies for heading to filling winter grains. Showers improve prospects for rain-fed wheat in northwestern Iran and maintain favorable conditions for vegetative to heading winter grains in Turkey.

North Africa: Moderate to heavy rain over the eastern half of the region provides additional soil moisture for heading to filling wheat and barley.

Australia: In eastern Australia, showers cause local delays in cotton and sorghum harvesting, but some areas are relatively dry, allowing fieldwork to progress with little interruption.

South America: Rain brings some relief from dryness to immature, second-crop (safrinha) corn in Parana, Brazil, but unfavorable dryness continues elsewhere in the south. In central Brazil, rain benefits safrinha corn but hampers soybean harvesting. Warm, dry weather returns to central Argentina, accelerating maturation and harvesting of summer grains and oilseeds.

South Africa: Conditions favor maturation and early harvesting of corn and other summer crops.

Canada: Seeding has begun across most of the country. Heavy flooding occurring along the Red River Valley will slow things for weeks ahead. The rest of Western Canada is sitting with decent spring moisture.