Swift Current-area farmer not too worried about quick melt

Spring is finally here, and many parts of the province have begun to experience warmer weather.

For farmers, this means getting one step closer to growing season.

Jim Hale is a farmer with an operation roughly an hour northwest of Swift Current. On Tuesday’s Greg Morgan Morning Show, Hale said he’s always a little bit nervous at this time of the year.

“You only get one shot to get this in the ground right, and you don’t really want to mess that up,” Hale said.

“Every year seems a little bit different, so you can never really tell what (might happen). You might get a curveball thrown at you, and you’re just kind of waiting on the pitch to see which way it’s going to break.”

Hale said he’s still seeing a lot of patchy snow on his fields, but he saw a very significant amount of melting on Sunday.

“Things have changed significantly, I would say, from Friday,” Hale said.

“Still some snow, lots of snow on the yards, but patches are showing. Monday morning it never actually froze, so things have kind of continued on in the meantime.”

Hale said he’s not too worried about a quick runoff leading to flooding.

But he said he is concerned about the runoff water ending up in sloughs and low areas rather than more preferable locations where it would be evenly distributed.

Hale mentioned that he’s currently working with variable-rate technology this year. That means he’s been working with a company to map the topography and fertility of his fields, which will help make a digital prescription for the field.

“That will change as we move along through the field to vary the amount of fertilizer and seed that we apply to the field as we need it,” Hale said.