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Parched Prairies Receive Desperately Needed Rain

Hot muggy weather across much of central Alberta on Monday, led to a series of thunderstorms that rolled through last evening.

Environment Canada is calling for more showers and possible storms today and cooler temperatures over the next couple of days. So far, no reports of damage from the storms, some of which were severe. According to the latest crop report from Alberta agriculture, 91 percent of all major crop acres are now up across the province. Spring wheat is 94 percent emerged...that's six points ahead of the five-year average, while barley is 87 percent emerged. Canola has about 87 percent of the acres planted, emerged. Tame hay and pastureland are doing better, thanks to the rain we've had recently. The report shows that large areas of the peace and southern regions continue to be drier than normal.

Next door in Saskatchewan, concerns about a worsening drought have all but disappeared for the time being, thanks to a major rain event on the weekend. Some areas received a few inches of rain from the slow-moving storm front that came up from the US. That same storm system dumped upwards of 8 inches of rain on parts of the Dakotas, which were also very dry.

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Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way

Video: Learning to Wrench From Dad the Hard Way



Harvest is a week out and the farm picked this week to fall apart. The truck needs a battery, the barn curtain's got a problem, and the corn and beans are telling us we're out of time to get it all fixed.

So it's a full day of wrenching. Tork supervises while I get the truck back running, then we're out at the hog barn where one rusted up part has the whole curtain system hung up. Ladder work, cable work, and a little dad-and-son disagreement about the right way to do it. We close it out walking the fields, shelling beans and checking corn, because whether everything's fixed or not, harvest starts when harvest starts.

Chapters: 00:00 Everything breaks the week before harvest 01:00 Tork supervises while I fix the truck 12:30 Out to the barn to find the curtain problem 14:30 One rusty part hung up the whole curtain 20:00 Running the curtain cable from the ladder 24:00 Walking the beans and corn before harvest 26:30 Wrapping up

We're a 6th generation family farm in southeast Iowa showing the real ups and downs of pig farming and row crop farming. No script, just the work. Subscribe and follow along.

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