(Alice McFarlane/farmnewsNOW Staff)

By Alice McFarlane

Plant 2019

Cool weather effects crop emergence and pasture

May 23, 2019 | 2:00 PM

Seeding progress almost doubled last week thanks to very few disruptions in the weather and relatively good seeding conditions.

The Saskatchewan Ministry of Agriculture reported 75 per cent of the crop is now seeded, up from 38 per cent the previous week.

Crops Extension Specialist Cory Jacob said moisture conditions are on the minds of many farmers.

“Tremendous seeding progress, good weather conditions for seeding, in terms of not a lot of weather delays,” Jacobs said. “I haven’t heard of anybody across the province that wouldn’t welcome rain at this time.”

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Seeding is 68 per cent complete in the northwest and east central regions while the northeast at 62 per cent. The west central area is at 75 per cent.

Jacob said an area of concern is with pastures and hay land slow to green up due to the cool weather.

“They’re coming slowly but for livestock producers it is a concern especially those that don’t have a lot of feed reserves left,” Jacob said. “They don’t have too many options.”

Cold weather also slowed crop emergence and germination but Jacob said that may be a good thing. Environment Canada is forecasting a low of 1 Celsius for Melfort Saturday night.

“We’ve had overnight temperatures go below zero this past week. There is still that risk of frost and we don’t want to see any producers affected by it but it is a possibility with our night time temperatures getting to that freezing mark,” Jacob said.

Cold temperatures are making pre-seeding weed control difficult as there is little weed growth.

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alice.mcfarlane@jpbg.ca

On Twitter: AliceMcF