Thousands of Potato Acres Unharvested in Canada
Bad harvest weather has produced damages in Manitoba, Canada, where a lot more than 5000 acres of potato remained unharvested.
“We ended up with about 5,200 acres left in the ground. That’s unprecedented in the history of potatoes I guess in the last 50 years,” Dan Sawatzky, manager of the Keystone Potato Growers Association told the Keystone Agricultural Producers advisory council meeting, according to manitobacooperator.ca.
There have been frozen potatoes and unharvested fields before, but 2018 was different, Sawatzky said later in an interview.
“It has never been as widespread as this and never the percentage of acreage. It’s quite a setback,” he said.
Based on potatoes harvested earlier this fall yields were expected to be the third highest on record, he said, which no doubt adds to the disappointment. But September rains delayed harvest and a hard frost hit October 10 or 11.
“Not half the potato growers had their crop off at that stage,” Sawatzky told the KAP meeting.
Frost went down into the soil three inches, damaging tubers. Some farmers continued to dig and store those potatoes. They could spoil, although so far they are holding up, he said.