34 / SEEDWORLD.COM SEPTEMBER 2018 1943 2018 th Anniversary “Buildquality equipment, andbackitup.” — Al Chantland Economically improve your seed bagging performance with our Compact Weigh 4300 Bagging Scale and AP1000 Automatic Bag Placer. • Fast & Efficient • Increases Workflow Productivity • Superior Weighing And Filling Accuracy • Install our bag placer into your existing packaging line Ph: 515.332.4045 | chantland@chantland.com | chantland.com Experience unparalleled reliability... for one firm price. Fast installation and start-up with no surprises or hidden costs. Chantland MHS ConvEyIng | PACkAgIng | PAllEtIzIng Seed Packaging Performance that’s What Sets Chantland MHS Apart Compact Weigh 4300 Bagging Scale AP1000 Automatic Bag Placer insurers generally won’t offer insurance until a minimum number of acres are intercropped in a province. “Acres are very significant, but many aren’t insuring, so the numbers officially aren’t there,” says Rosengren. In terms of harvesting and selling intercropped mixtures, Chalmers says producers might need to modify equipment or buy rotary harrows and will need at least two working augers. Another risk is if buyers are not OK with a small amount of contamination if seed from another crop is found in a producer’s sample, Chalmers points out. “There’s no way you can clean out every canola seed in pea,” he says. In terms of agronomics, there’s both an art and a science to intercropping, and it takes keen observation and a lot of trial- and-error to figure out what works best. For Rosengren, who this year will grow forage oats/peas, flax/chickpea, corn/soybean/flax, pea/mustard/lentil, camelina/ lentil, and flax/chickpea/soybean, intercropping works best when the crops have different resource requirements — water, sunlight and topography. “Peas and lentils perform better in hilltops on lighter soils, and soybeans and peas are wetter crops for us, so we change the populations to put them in the areas where they’re best suited. We’ve gained extra yield by doing so,” he explains. Last year, Rosengren saw something extremely interesting in his barley crop, which was planted alone on a full soil profile following an intercropped mixture. Though it was a very dry year with only 2.5 inches of rain, he got the highest yields on barley he’d ever seen. “I think there’s been more disease impact than I’ve appreci- ated in those particular zones,” he says. “Why do we not nor- mally achieve those yields? I believe it’s because of leaf diseases and sub-clinical or sub-treatment levels of diseases and stresses in a monoculture situation that’s suppressing the yield. Putting in other crops has been the best way to suppress the diseases.” Rosengren runs full oil profile tests on his camelina for Three Farmers, and when intercropped, the camelina oil is of very high quality, quite apart from potential damage wrought by diseases and pests. When Rosengren and his Three Farmers partners first started intercropping, they ran strip trials to compare inter- cropped and monocropped systems, but they soon abandoned the practice because the benefits were so obvious. “There are a million products that offer two extra bushels of yield per acre, but that’s pretty hard to measure,” he says. “When you’re talking 25 to 30 percent extra yield, it’s signifi- cant enough to measure. It was enough that we quit doing the strips.” Axten also believes intercropping is the way of the future for Western Canadian farming. “I think of all the problems that have happened in agricul- ture, things that have come to light in the last 15 years. We keep trying to do this monocrop thing, but I don’t think we’re show- ing that it works very well.” SW