For more information go to their website, NPAS or contact Theresa Labuhn at tlnpsas@drtel.net or 701-883-4304

Summary prepared by Myriam Fernandez

Root and crown rot are important and widespread cereal diseases present in most parts of the world, and among the most damaging diseases of cereal crops in western Canada. Some of the pathogens commonly isolated from affected roots and crowns of wheat, barley, and oat in SK are Fusarium species, also responsible for Fusarium head blight in cereals.

By Brenda Frick

Buyers of organic grains are approaching the new marketing year with guarded optimism. They see product beginning to move, and prices fairly stable, perhaps even creeping slowly upward.

This is good news to organic producers who have been discouraged by stalled markets in the last couple of years. Predicting organic prices is a bit like forecasting the weather.

by Myriam Fernandez, Ph. D.

In 2010, a tillage by rotation experiment was set up on three of the five acres. The objective of this first organic agronomic trial in the Brown soil zone is to investigate the impacts of tillage reduction and benefits of diversified crop rotations on weed control, soil fertility, crop production, diseases, rhizosphere microbial populations, carbon footprint, and economic returns under organic management and water-limited conditions in this semi-arid region.