A challenging growing season, followed by a gruelling harvest. For many prairie farmers, 2016 has been a case study in the risks of crop production and a reminder of just how much is beyond the farmer鈥檚 control.
On a cool day in early November, Siegert Wenning was looking forward to getting harvest wrapped up.
鈥淲e still have 350 acres of canola in a swath,鈥� says Wenning, who farms 4,500 acres of canola, peas and oats near Yorkton, Sask.
Despite the harvest headaches, he鈥檚 taking things in stride. In recent years, Wenning has been fine-tuning his ability to manage the condition of his stored grain. In some ways, this has given him back some of the control and managed some of the risk posed by the year鈥檚 punishing farming conditions.
The grain management system he wanted
Wenning arrived in Saskatchewan from Holland in 2005. Just seven years later, a windstorm tore through his farmyard and levelled most of it, destroying the farm鈥檚 grain bins. Wenning decided to build a new grain management system with the most current technology.
In previous years, he鈥檇 learned a lot about grain quality management, the hard way. Grain quality can change so quickly that monitoring must take place around the clock, without fail.
鈥淵ou might be planning to go in there with your hand-held, but something comes up and you don鈥檛,鈥� Wenning says. 鈥淵ou could have some cold weather, but there鈥檚 snow on the roof and so you鈥檙e feeling pretty comfortable about what鈥檚 in the bin. You find out later that it heated up and the quality goes down.鈥�
Constant monitoring, hourly reporting
Wenning settled on the OPI Blue system that automatically monitors the temperature and moisture of grain in a bin. These values are gathered by means of two vertical cables that run through the bin, with sensors located at 4-ft. intervals. This allows the system to take precise temperature and moisture readings at many different places within the bin. That鈥檚 something you just can鈥檛 do when sampling grain from limited access points, and when many parts of the bin are simply out of reach.
For Wenning, the real magic is what happens next. OPI Blue wirelessly delivers hourly data on temperature and moisture for each bin to either desktop or mobile devices, anywhere in the world.
Last winter, Wenning travelled back to Holland for a visit. With a delivery date to his elevator coming up fast, he was concerned about the condition of the canola in one of his bins. He kept an eye on the bin through OPI Blue on his iPad. Even though Wenning was 4,000 miles from home, he didn鈥檛 miss the critical moment when it came.
鈥淚 could see the temperature in the bin was starting to take off,鈥� he says. 鈥淚 phoned my son on the farm to turn the fans on, and that saved the grain in that bin.鈥�
Return on Investment
How does Wenning know he鈥檚 making money on his investment in grain quality management?
He considers the math to be straightforward.
鈥淵ou have 13,000 bushels of IP canola, at $12 per bushel,鈥� says Wenning. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 a lot of money sitting in that bin. You can buy quite a few OPI systems for that. Look at how much money is in the bin, and compare that to the system cost, it鈥檚 peanuts.鈥�
Like many prairie farmers, Siegert Wenning was glad to see the end of the 2016 growing season. With most of his crops safely in the bin, and a proven grain management system in OPI Blue, Wenning likes his chances from here on in.
鈥淓verything right now is damp and tough,鈥� he says. 鈥淲e dry all the canola anyway, but we might have to dry it twice to get it down to 10% moisture. Right now I鈥檓 checking the system all the time 鈥� whenever we stop for coffee and before I go to bed. The system is a lifesaver when you have nothing but tough grain.鈥�
