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FEBRUARY 2023
Vol. 108 Issue 2

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7 days ago

Farmland Advantage is receiving a $445,000 grant from the federal government. The program, the “brainchild” of Invermere cattle rancher Dave Zehnder, provides compensation to farmers for their conservation efforts to protect BC’s grasslands, riparian areas and wildlife habitat. The funding from Environment and Climate Change Canada under the Species at Risk Partnerships on Agricultural Lands (SARPAL) and Priority Places programs, will be administered by the Investment Agriculture Foundation of BC. Rewarding farmers for enhancing riparian areas appeared in our March 2022 edition and you can view it at ... See MoreSee Less

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Rewarding farmers for enhancing riparian areas

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INVERMERE – Farmers and ranchers in the Columbia Valley will continue to see rewards for taking action to conserve and enhance important riparian areas on their farms. The Windermere District Farmer...
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2 weeks ago

A standing-room only crowd of more than 250 people attended a public hearing the Agricultural Land Commission hosted in Langley Monday night regarding a proposal to include 305 acres controlled by the federal government in the Agricultural Land Reserve. More than 76,000 people have signed an online petition asking municipal and provincial governments to protect the land from development, and for the federal government to grant a long-term lease to the Heppells. Read more in this morning's Farm News Update from Country Life in BC. conta.cc/3XYXw6k ... See MoreSee Less

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Your weekly farm news update

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The agricultural news source in British Columbia since 1915 January 25 2023 Surrey ALR inclusion cheered A standing-room only crowd of more than 250 people attended a public hearing the Agricultural L
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Mike Manion Pitt Meadows City Councillor

2 months ago

Christmas tree growers in BC are seeing strong demand this season and prices remain comparable to last year. But the number of tree farms has decreased dramatically over the past five years and the province will increasingly need to look elsewhere if it wants to meet local demand. More in this week's Farm News Update from Country Life in BC. ... See MoreSee Less

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Christmas trees in demand

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Christmas tree growers in BC are seeing strong demand, with high quality trees making it to market. “The market is good. We’ll probably outdo last year and last year was one of our best years…
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2 months ago

Another four poultry flocks in the Fraser Valley have tested positive for avian influenza over the weekend -- 15 in the last week alone. There are 60 farms currently under quarantine in BC, more than any other province in Canada and three times that of Alberta, which ranks second. Officials maintain the virus is being spread by dust and groundwater and not farm-to-farm transmission. No farms in the Interior have tested positive this fall. ... See MoreSee Less

Another four poultry flocks in the Fraser Valley have tested positive for avian influenza over the weekend -- 15 in the last week alone. There are 60 farms currently under quarantine in BC, more than any other province in Canada and three times that of Alberta, which ranks second. Officials maintain the virus is being spread by dust and groundwater and not farm-to-farm transmission. No farms in the Interior have tested positive this fall.
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Avian influenza virus can be killed by chlorine at no higher a concentration than is present in drinking water, so unless farms are using untreated groundwater in their barns I don't see how it could be a source of transmission. www.researchgate.net/publication/5594208_Chlorine_Inactivation_of_Highly_Pathogenic_Avian_Influen...

2 months ago

In a surprise move, Lana Popham -- hailed at the recent BC Dairy Industry Conference as a key ally of the agriculture sector -- has been replaced by Abbotsford-Mission MLA Pam Alexis as part of a cabinet overhaul today by new BC premier David Eby. Popham will now oversee Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport. The two ministers worked closely together following the atmospheric river events last fall. ... See MoreSee Less

In a surprise move, Lana Popham -- hailed at the recent BC Dairy Industry Conference as a key ally of the agriculture sector -- has been replaced by Abbotsford-Mission MLA Pam Alexis as part of a cabinet overhaul today by new BC premier David Eby. Popham will now oversee Tourism, Arts, Culture and Sport. The two ministers worked closely together following the atmospheric river events last fall.Image attachment
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Goes to show how far-removed our current government is from the agricultural sector. To put someone in this position who has no farming background is a slap in the face to all of our hard-working producers.

Going to be a heck of a learning curve. Helping the agricultural community recover from the biggest natural disasters in history, handling the avian influenza outbreak that is threatening our poultry industry, dealing with a crisis in meat processing, managing ongoing threats from climate change, supporting producers who are facing unprecedented inflation in an industry with very slim margins to begin with..... to name a few of the challenges our new Minister will have to face all with one of the lowest budgets of any ministry. I wish her the best of luck but I hope she's got a lot of support around her.

Best of wishes in your new position

Congrats to Pam, cool to see a Fraser Valley based ag minister but also so sad to see Lana reassigned . I have no doubt she will do an amazing job in her new role.

Will be missed by #meiernation

Bryce Rashleigh

Nooooooo!

Lana did a shit job and now we have a minister with no farming background at all. Aren’t we lucky..

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Cool weather is good news

[MYRNA STARK LEADER]

April 13, 2022 byKate Ayers

The cooler weather that rolled into the province this week bodes well for the Southern Interior, where warm temperatures at the end of March accelerated snowmelt beyond historical norms.

Province-wide, the snowpack averaged 99% of normal on April 1, according to the monthly report from the BC River Forecast Centre. This is down from 105% of normal on March 1, thanks to a combination of dry conditions and relatively warm temperatures in late March.

Individual basins run from a high of 134% in the Northwest to 72% in the Chilcotin.

“[The Okanagan] dropped from 86% of normal on March 1 to 74%,” says River Forecast Centre hydrologist Jonathan Boyd. “We’ve got one site at Brenda Mine, which is located on the connector between Merritt and Kelowna. It goes back about 30 years of data at an automated station with measurements taken every hour. … Right now, it’s pushing to be one of the earliest melts ever recorded at that station. That’s pretty substantial.”

But the arrival of cooler weather this week should help slow the rate of melting.

“It’s an ideal situation for Merritt and the Okanagan and lower elevation areas in the Cariboo and Chilcotin,” Boyd says. “For the agricultural side of things and areas in the Interior, it’s probably a positive to get into cooler conditions for the next week or so and wetter conditions.”

Cool, wet weather not only slows the melting but can add to the snowpack. Ideally, this will extend its life further into the spring, if favourable conditions prevail.

“The best case scenario for anyone in agriculture is to have the snow melt process get delayed as long as possible without any catastrophic flooding and keeping flows higher into the summer months,” explains Boyd.

While this week’s conditions may lower the risk of freshet-related flooding this spring in the Interior, it’s difficult to predict how the weather will impact the wildfire season.

“It really revolves around the weather as we move into May and June and into the summer,” says Boyd. “For areas in the South Interior, it’s definitely on aim to be on the worse-side-of-things, to have less snow. The catch-22 is that if you have high snow, which is better for drought and wildfire, it’s riskier for floods. Ideally, we want those average years, but they never seem to happen.”

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