Every Canadian knows Mother Nature has a mind of her own.
Nowhere does that hit home more than on a farm. Ask any farmer what their biggest challenge is and you’re sure to hear “weather.” From hail to frost to drought, climate change and changing weather patterns are creating a lot of challenges for farmers.
Take the Renwick family, whose farm is on the edge of a 75-foot cliff above Lake Erie. Severe weather has caused it to erode, putting their land – and crop yield – at risk. “In some cases, we maybe lose a couple of feet every year,” says Chris Renwick. “Unfortunately, the shoreline erosion is something we can’t do a whole lot about.”
The big four weather nightmares
Weather has always presented problems for farmers. But with climate change, it’s often less predictable, and some challenges are getting worse. Here are just a few ways weather makes life on the farm harder.
Extreme heat: Warmer weather can make growing seasons longer, but it’s also risky when it comes to water availability. Droughts are a big concern for farmers of all kinds.
Big storms: Severe rain events can lead to huge floods that can wipe out farmers’ crops.
Unpredictable frost: Frost can damage crops, especially when it comes at unseasonable times farmers aren’t expecting.
More weeds, pests and disease: Warmer temperatures can lead to more weeds and new pests that stick around longer.
Luckily, farmers like the Renwicks are finding ways to fight back, so they can keep crops healthy in the face of climate change.
Quick Fact
Did you know that in total, plant science innovations in Canada have decreased greenhouse gas emissions by 30 million tonnes per year? That’s because farmers can use their equipment less, saving diesel fuel. Plus, farmland stores a tremendous amount of carbon, some of which would be released to the atmosphere during tillage.
Standing up to Mother Nature
Plant science innovations can create more adaptive crops, so we can farm more crops with less land.
Today, we can genetically modify crops to resist certain herbicides, making weed control more efficient. That also means farmers don’t need to till their soil as often, which keeps carbon in the ground, instead of the air, and the soil healthier. In Canada, conservation tillage practices have let farmers cut their fossil fuel use, while also keeping their soil more resistant to erosion from wind and water.
“We do our best to make sure that we’re producing a clean, healthy product that goes to the world – to feed the world,” Chris says. “We did a lot of tilling the soil before, to try to control the weeds. Now, with the introduction of more herbicides in the market, we’re able to spray the fields, instead of having to work them. It cuts down on erosion, we’re able to keep the soil structure better, we’re able to keep the organisms in the soil working better and we’re able to not use as much diesel fuel.”
Adapting crops means we can improve farming practices, so we can reduce greenhouse gas emissions, such as by limiting how often farmers have to pass over their fields with tractors, which cuts down on fuel use and emissions.
Saving land for the next generation
Look at it this way: without innovations such as biotech crops, we’d need almost 50 per cent more land to grow the same amount of food we do today.
For the Renwicks, standing up to weather also means keeping their farm in the family for years to come. They’ve been farming the land in Chatham-Kent County for more than 200 years, and their farm is the heart of their family history.
“I’ve seen five generations on this farm,” says Chris’ father, Tom Renwick. “We’re hoping that the generations continue to follow along behind us and maybe in another 200 years, we’ll make it to 400,” says Tom Renwick.
Planting more resilient crops means they can keep it that way.
“I hope that one of my children decide that they want to farm,” Chris says. “I hope that they can continue to enjoy what it’s like to be able to be on the farm.”
Quick Fact
Without plant science, we’d need 50 per cent more farmland in Canada to grow what we do today — that’s more than the areas of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island combined.