If there was ever a golden rule when conversing with a plant breeder, it may be this: Be prepared. To talk plant breeding requires a colossal amount of brainpower, especially once you dive into the genetic nitty-gritty.

It’s a good thing Chantelle Donahue is used to wearing multiple hats. Because she just added one more.

For grain exporting nations like Canada, identifying grain quality for sale is a vital step in the successful marketing of a crop. Being able to segregate the crop by quality, and being able to maintain those segregations through the handling system and into the end user’s control, facilitates the export of grains as well as price determination.

The fight against scald is underway for one of Canada’s premier feed varieties.

A few decades ago, before Big Rock Brewery became the behemoth it is today, barley farmer Richard Nordstrom took a tour of the updated Canada Malting factory in Calgary. He was pleased to see his good-humoured friend Ed McNally was on the same tour.

This past fall will go down as one of the more challenging harvests in recent memory. Persistent showers, interspersed with heavy rains and even snow, made progress feel like a real grind through much of the Prairies. Unfortunately, this also affected grain quality, with the cereals being impacted most heavily.

In the last 25 years, How much have our agricultural education programs changed to encourage enrolment? For certain, the student demographic has changed. Fewer people are living on farms, so there are fewer post-secondary students with a farming background.

About three years ago, we started hearing determined rumblings about the end of the Canadian Wheat Board. Tensions amongst farmers were running high, but the government’s agenda was clear: It was time to open up grain marketing in Western Canada.

In 21st-century agriculture, E.A. Partridge and Sintaluta, SK, are little more than footnotes in the history books. And yet Partridge and the tiny farming community about an hour east of Regina, SK, played a major role in shaping a farmer-controlled grain industry in Western Canada.