Canola [for CCP]

[pitw]

  This spring Richard and I were talking[or at least i was listening ] and he inquired about canola.  I said I would take some pics and try to tell a bit about it for him and as it takes a season to grow it may have seemed I forgot .  Anyway as an early Birthday present here is the post I promised way back then.
  Canola is one of the best cash crops in Western Canada and is grown for it's oil content.  It's a small round seed that is planted fairly shallow and is subject to flea beetles as soon as it emerges, then there is weeds to knock out of it[both pay me well] and then there is sclerientina[mushroom type fungus], black leg[I can't help here] and then Diamond back moths that can eat more than the Chinese.  This year where I am we had a great year for it and guys are pulling off from 40-62 bushels/acre and it's soaring in price to $11/bushel.  One of my customers put in his whole 4,000 acres to canola this spring as it looked like we were going to dry out and he was looking at crop insurance[pays higher for canola] for it.  Then the rains came and the man is averaging 43bu/acre and is he is smiling all day long.
  It starts as.


Then grows a mite.


Then starts to bolt.




Before it goes to full bloom like the far field.[Some idiot lost a bunch of pics too].


It is swathed fairly green as it will thresh out if ripe.




The seeds will turn black and ripe in the swath. 








Got a fellow who was hauling it to market this summer to pose for this picture in Saskatchewan[thanks CCP for the new friend I made that day.


Then they combine it and it is the easiest thing in the world to thresh.


  This stuff stinks like [L] while flowering and if I wasn't such an idiot you'd be able to see yellow for up to 10 miles in one direction[interspersed with green].  It can be a great producer but cost's more to seed and maintain than wheat, it also has more enemies than a frog but it seems to get more help .
  Monsanto has created our worst weed by modifying it to be Roundup Ready.  Here are a couple pics of some that has been sprayed with chemicals that should have killed it but you be the judge.

[nastygunz]

Thats pretty neat...we always cook with canola oil and never even thought where it come from..do deer eat the plants at all ?

[alscalls]

Very interesting.......

[pitw]

Thats pretty neat...we always cook with canola oil and never even thought where it come from..do deer eat the plants at all ?

  Deer and even moose will eat this stuff but they like hiding in it even better.  I've chased many around in a fully grown field and the best one was a bull moose who got his legs tangled up and went down.  I  at rgat one.

[FinsnFur]

Wow, that's about all the knowledge I could absorb this morning. Insanely interesting.
Thanks CCP

Ohh, and you too Barry for the pics

[slagmaker]

Very interesting. I had thought the canola plant was similar to a sunflower.

Thanks for the horticulture lesson.

[CCP]

THANKS Barry that is COOOOL   never seen anything like that here. I saved the pics to my computer and put them on a disc to take over and show my dad.

I can quickly see why they have to plant so any acres of the stuff, "them some little fellers."

Bet there are a {L} of alot of small screens in the combines to harvest them. Could only imagine some stopping up and spitting a few hundred dollars on the ground quick.