Canola is an oilseed crop mostly grown in western Canada. There are several factors that need to be considered in order to obtain optimal yields. These factors include seeding rate, seeding date, seeding speed, seeding depth and herbicide spray timing. This demo aimed to educate growers on how important these agronomic practices are in canola seeding and how they translate into crop development and eventual yield at the end of the season. Alberta crop statistics has shown a decrease in canola production of 1.2% and a decrease in yield of 3.2% over the past 22 years (Crop statistics | Alberta.ca,2025). Alberta in 2024 showed a decrease in canola yield by 10.6% below the five-year average (Agriculture Alberta and Analytics Branch Data, 2024).

It is possible some of the decrease in canola yield, besides weather, can be attributed to poor BMP (best management practice) adoption. Yet canola remains one of the dominant cash crops for the region and it is one of the cash crops that brings the most economic profit to growers. With this visual education tool, growers may identify some plots seeded and associate them with problems they may have encountered in their own farms. As such, plots in this demonstration will show growers the importance of accounting for all the effects that may influence canola stands and consequently, canola yield.

Producers were invited to summer field tours and allowed to observe the difference of seeding rate, seeding date, seeding speed, seeding depth and herbicide spray timing effects in canola. In this way, there was a visual and clear difference between following the guidelines given for these effects and ignoring them. This demonstration was made to raise questions as to why demonstration plots are so different from each other, and we will use photographic observations to further demonstrate BMPs through other knowledge dissemination methods such as newsletters.

Click here to view the full report from our 2025 Annual Report.