Consistent rain has kept planters idle this spring
By Diego Flammini
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Ontario cash crop farmers are still waiting for Mother Nature to give them a consistent planting window.
Cool temperatures and consecutive days of rain have led to soggy fields and idle planters.
For some farmers, spring 2019 is one of the wettest they can remember.
“We spread some manure but it was getting packed too much so we had to quit, and we have no corn planted right now,” Gord Masters, a farmer from Kawartha Lakes, Ont., told Farms.com.
“We have a book that we write down the dates we start, and last year on May 9 we had planted over 300 acres of corn. The weather broke around May 11 and by the time June 6 rolled around we were done planting our corn and soybeans.”
Masters has drainage on his farm, but not enough water is being ushered off the land to allow for any planting because of the soil type.
“It’s heavy clay around here so it takes a while to dry out,” he said. “The drainage just can’t keep up.”
Warren Trask, a cash cropper from Wellington County, echoed Masters’s sentiments about the wet spring.
“I can’t ever remember getting started this late,” he told Farms.com.
“My dad is 84-years-old, has done about 75 years of cropping and he can’t remember a spring being this wet this late either.”
Trask is, however, using the downtime to make sure his equipment is ready to go once his fields dry up.
“We’ve got lots of time to do machinery maintenance,” he said. “We might as well use this time to get everything running well so once the weather cooperates we can get out there.”
Unfortunately for farmers, it looks like more rain is on the way this week.
Rain is in the forecast for Wellington County and Kawartha Lakes on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Sunday, Monday and Tuesday.