Pea leaf Weevil forecast looks threatening for southern Alberta

There is the potential for a damaging pea life weevil infestation in southern Alberta this spring according to the latest forecast released by Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development.

The forecast is based on a survey of damaged crops in late May and early June 2014 (and can be found online at:  http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$department/deptdocs.nsf/all/prm15134)

Apparently the pea leaf weevil damage in 2014 was quite a bit higher than in 2013 and the government is warning producers south of Highway 1 along with the counties of Kneehill, Wheatland, Newell and Cypress that pea leaf weevil populations are expected to reach damaging levels in 2015.

If we have a warm spring e.g. >20 degrees C for more than a few days in late April or early May the damage will be increased as the warm weather encourages the weevils to arrive early.

Pea leaf weevils will feed on many crops but the larvae will do the most damage to peas and fababeans which act as reproductive hosts.  Apparently they can also do serious damage to seedling alfalfa and less severe damage to lentils and dry beans.

With pea prices the way they are, I am expecting there will be quite a few acres of peas going into southern Alberta in 2015, so farmers will need to be on watch for pea leaf weevil.

How to avoid having problems?  Suggestions from Alberta Ag are to treat your seed, plant early, seed with good levels of innoculant to encourage high yield, and use foliar insecticides if levels reach economic thresholds and if the peas are at the correct stage for spraying - check the blue book for this info.

On our front, we will be advising customers to treat their peas with a seed treatment that can control pea leaf weevils.  Research (see this Top Crop Manager article for more info) suggests that seed treatments are more effective at controlling pea leaf weevils than foliar sprays which can produce inconsistent results.

My take on the barley yield figures in the Yield 2015 Alberta publication.

I've already shared my quick notes on the wheat data in the Yield 2015 Alberta Magazine published by AFSC & Alberta Farmer.  Now let's talk barley!

The Yield 2015 Alberta publication lists the crop insurance acres & yields by variety and risk area in the province.  You can see multiple years of data but for now I am focusing on 2014, which, as we know was a bit of a tough year on barley with snow and bad conditions at harvest. Keeping in mind that these conditions had an impact on the results, I will take you through the highlights....


BARLEY ON IRRIGATION RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
The barley results mix malt barley and feed, 2 row and 6 row results.  So I am going to look at all barley together for the sake of simplicity.

There seems to be less demand for 6 row barley these days but when you see the yield results on irrigation, it makes you wonder why.  Top yields for barley on irrigation are:

• Muskwa 6 row Feed (SeedNet) - avg 106 bu was tops on irrigation
• CDC Yorkton 6 row malt (Canterra) - avg 104 bu
• CDC Coalition 2 row feed (Canterra) - avg 97 bu
• AC Harper 6 row malt (Secan) - avg 96 bu
• Vivar 6 row feed (Secan) - avg 96 bu
• CDC Thompson 2 row feed(FP Genetics) - avg 94 bu
• CDC Austenson 2 row feed (Secan) & Xena 2 row feed (CPS) - avg 88 bu

Other varieties were below these yields.

BARLEY ON DRYLAND RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
There is a long list of varieties in the dryland barley table.  I was surprised to see how well the malt barleys do for yield in general on dryland.  Many folks don't consider growing malt barley varieties that are a little less popular than Metcalfe and Copeland but many of these other varieties yield very well for feed and can go for malt depending on demand. 

The top varieties, in 2014, province-wide for barley on dryland were:

Tops:

• AC Major (CPS) 2 row malt barley - avg 79 bu
• Merit 57 (Canterra) 2 row malt barley - avg 75 bu
• AAC Synergy 2 row malt (Syngenta), CDC Coalition 2 row feed (Canterra), and CDC Polar Star 2 row malt (Canterra) - avg 73 bu

Close seconds:

• Vivar, Formosa, Stander, and CDC Kindersley were in that 70 - 72 bu range
• CDC Maverick, Lacey, Trochu, Thompson, Sundre, Ponoka, Newdale, Champion, Austenson, CDC Meredith, and Xena were in the 64-69 bu range.

 
OTHER RISK AREAS:
I would encourage you to get a copy of this publication and look at the results in your risk area of the province.  I would also recommend that you look at not just the results for 2014 but also the results for prior years because, as every farmer knows, every year has it's unique set of challenges.

THE FINAL WORD:
In these last few blogs my focus has been on yield results.  Obviously, yield is important but many farmers will sacrifice a bit of yield if they can get better standability or quality.  In addition, markets are very important and our two best selling varieties this year are AC Metcalfe and CDC Copeland because these two varieties are in demand with malt companies.  So yield is important but really it all boils down to what is going to work best on your farm.

Interesting wheat variety info from Yield 2015 Alberta magazine

Well on the surface, it may not seem like an exciting read, but when you look really close, there is some interesting data to be found in Yield 2015 Alberta Magazine published by AFSC & Alberta Farmer.

The publication lists the crop insurance acres & yields by variety and risk area in the province and it's interesting to sift through the results.

Here's what I learned about HRSW results in 2014 from this publication.  Of course, everyone knows that 2014 was a bit of a tough year for some parts of the province at harvest so that weather will have impacted the results.  So with that disclaimer, here we go...

HRSW DRYLAND WHEAT RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
The wheat chart is a bit tough to read because it mixes all types of wheat together (HRS, SWS, HRW, CPS, DW etc.).  However, looking just at the HRSW varieties, in 2014, province-wide the highest yielding HRSW dryland varieties were:

Tops:

• Muchmore HRSW (FP Genetics) was a standout- avg 60 bu
• AAC Bailey HRSW (Canterra) - new variety - avg 54 bu
• CDC Plentiful HRSW (FP Genetics) - also new - avg 53 bu
• Harvest HRSW - avg 53 bu

Close Seconds:

• CDC Stanley, CDC Abound, CDC Utmost, CDC Imagine were in the 51 - 52 bu range.
• Stettler, CDC Go, Carberry, CDC Thrive, Cardale, CDC Osler, & Journey were in that 48-49 bu range.

Other varieties had a range of lower yields.

I should briefly mention that the varietal blends (midge resistant variety mixes) did very well with Goodeve VB from Alliance topping the list with a 54 bu average. Snowbird which is a HWW from Secan was also high in the list at 58 bu average yield in 2014.

HRSW IRRIGATION WHEAT RESULTS - PROVINCE WIDE:
In 2014, province wide the highest yielding HRSW irrigation varieties were:

• Cardale HRS (Seed Depot distributed through SeedNet) - avg 85 bu
• CDC Go (public variety) - avg 82 bu
• Carberry (Secan) - avg 78 bu
• Superb (Secan) - avg 77 bu
• Muchmore (FP Genetics) - avg 74 bu
• CDC Abound - avg 73 bu

Again the VB varieties did well with Shaw (Secan) leading the way with an avg 78 bu.

RISK AREA 3 - TABER:
It is interesting to look in your particular risk area in this publication to see which varieties are being grown and how they have done.  So in the my area of Taber, on dryland in 2014, Taber's top HRSW varieties were AC Carberry (Secan) - avg 49 bu and Glenn (Canterra) - avg 48 bu with CDC Go coming in at 46 bu.

I should also note that if a variety wasn't grown by at least 5 producers, they exclude it from the list which might explain why I didn't see Muchmore, Bailey, Plentiful, or Harvest listed in our area.

On irrigation in 2014, Taber's top HRSW varieties were CDC Go - avg 93 bu, Cardale (Seed Depot/SeedNet) - avg 88 bu, Carberry & Superb (Secan) - avg 82 bu.  I would argue that Muchmore should have been up there (full disclosure - we sell Muchmore and I am a fan) but it is listed at 77 bu on a very small amount of acres.


OTHER GENERAL WHEAT COMMENTS:
Of course, I like to look at the varieties that we grow and sell and make a few mental notes when I see something noteable.  I will say that Strongfield Durum (Secan) on irrigation is listed with an average yield of 82 bu province wide. That impressed me because it yielded right up there with the top HRSW varieties. Pasteur GP Wheat (Secan) is listed on irrigation province wide at 94 bu per acre, second only to AC Andrew (Secan) in 2014 at 100 bu.