Well, just because you dont need corn doesn't mean that the price of bulk cattle feed in texas, which requires corn, goes down. If it was cheaper to ship it from iowa, im sure they would.
As a southern Alberta farmer, I can tell you why we grow corn. We have a lot of livestock to feed and feeding them Alfalfa and barley are not going to be sufficient. A lot of corn is turned into silage which can’t be Shipped.. We do not drill into our aquifer to water this corn so we are not depleting our resources to do it. If we were drilling into the aquifer to grow this crop, I would agree. The watershed that we are utilizing for irrigation runs into the Hudson Bay and gets recycled into the ocean. Seems like a waste to just let it all go back to the ocean and not use some of it. We already let the vast majority of it go back to the ocean so it’s not being wasted or affecting the environment poorly. The corn near Edmonton grows without any irrigation. You don’t see any pivots up there. They receive on average 18 inches of precipitation. They also have dark rich soil. So I think it’s maybe an oversight on his part because he doesn’t know the climate in the area. The aquifers in Alberta are untouched for irrigation. As part of Canada’s sovereignty, it’s also important that we sustain our own operations rather than depending on another country to ship us our corn, and silage is also something we can’t ship. We also can’t predict political tariffs. Nor do we want to compete with global commodity fluctuations with or livestock operations.
Yeah we don't need cattle to survive as species. We don't need corn either. There are alternatives that use far less water. This is a case of just because we can doesn't mean we should.
Then grow corn with no subsidies, show that the market is strong enough to support itself.
Well, just because you dont need corn doesn't mean that the price of bulk cattle feed in texas, which requires corn, goes down. If it was cheaper to ship it from iowa, im sure they would.
Dry land corn is okay. Irrigation???
As a southern Alberta farmer, I can tell you why we grow corn. We have a lot of livestock to feed and feeding them Alfalfa and barley are not going to be sufficient. A lot of corn is turned into silage which can’t be Shipped.. We do not drill into our aquifer to water this corn so we are not depleting our resources to do it. If we were drilling into the aquifer to grow this crop, I would agree. The watershed that we are utilizing for irrigation runs into the Hudson Bay and gets recycled into the ocean. Seems like a waste to just let it all go back to the ocean and not use some of it. We already let the vast majority of it go back to the ocean so it’s not being wasted or affecting the environment poorly. The corn near Edmonton grows without any irrigation. You don’t see any pivots up there. They receive on average 18 inches of precipitation. They also have dark rich soil.
So I think it’s maybe an oversight on his part because he doesn’t know the climate in the area. The aquifers in Alberta are untouched for irrigation. As part of Canada’s sovereignty, it’s also important that we sustain our own operations rather than depending on another country to ship us our corn, and silage is also something we can’t ship. We also can’t predict political tariffs. Nor do we want to compete with global commodity fluctuations with or livestock operations.
Yeah we don't need cattle to survive as species. We don't need corn either. There are alternatives that use far less water. This is a case of just because we can doesn't mean we should.
Exactly.