Storms, cold push Manitoba canola crop reseeding to three- year high

Manitoba farmers will have to reseed the most canola acres in three years after cold and stormy weather killed crops, the government said.

As of May 26, growers submitted 486 reseeding claims for the oilseed, the most since 2012, when 742 claims were filed, said David Koroscil, manager of insurance projects and sales at Manitoba Agricultural Services Corporation, a government- owned company that provides risk- management and financial services to farmers.

Freezing temperatures, sleet and wind “basically tore the stems of the canola plant off,” Koroscil said Tuesday from Portage la Prairie, Man.

Some plants seeded early in parts of the Prairies were damaged or killed after temperatures fell as low as - 6C ( 21F) earlier this month.

Frost, wind and excess moisture harmed canola, the province’s agriculture ministry said in a May 25 report.

The oilseed also represented the bulk of the 140 reseeding claims filed in Saskatchewan, the country’s biggest canola producer, according to the Saskatchewan Crop Insurance Corporation.

The figure is still well short of last spring, when 1,100 claims were submitted, said Darby Warner, executive director of the Melville, Sask.- based insurer.

“The saving grace was that the frost occurred early enough that the majority of the crop wasn’t out of the ground yet,” Warner said in a telephone interview on Tuesday.