Farmers in Thunder Bay are recovering and catching up after snowy, wet spring
CBC
Farmers living and working around Thunder Bay, Ont., say they're recovering now after a spring that looked more like a very long winter.
Some usually start planting crops as early as late April. But this year, fields and pastures were covered in snow, greenhouses collapsed and others were flooded.
Two months later, many farmers say, they're now caught up.
"What we've had to deal with has been piling all of our spring work into about four or five weeks," said Marcelle Paulin, the co-owner of Sleepy G. Farm in Pass Lake, Ont., about 40 minutes from Thunder Bay.
"So it's been very, very busy. Typically, we would do our spring work over, you know, seven weeks. But it's been sort of compressed."
This year's plants are still a bit smaller than they were at this time last year, Paulin said, but she added, "Things even out in the end. … Within a couple of weeks, I don't think I would see a difference."
Wheat and canola at Brule Creek Farms has already started to bounce back after being seeded two to three weeks later than last year, said owner Jeff Burke.
"There's a lot of moisture still in the ground," he said.
"And then we had about a week of very warm weather. And actually a lot of the wheat especially really bolted quickly. It's not caught up to where it probably would be at this time of year normally. But it's not as far behind as I expected."
Over at Stanley Hill Bison, feed crops have also benefited from the mixture of hot and rainy days, co-owner Tim Janssens said.
"We're only a week behind. It's not terrible," he said. "We've had worse years."
The Janssens are still out $8,000 due to losses in the spring though, co-owner Ashley Janssens said.
They were unable to get animals out of the pasture for their first abattoir date of the year because the terrain was too snowy and wet to drive their vehicles on.
But while most farmers report catching up after a difficult spring, some are still facing challenges related to the weather.
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