The Great Falls area of north central Montana experienced the 22 nd coolest year, and slightly below average precipitation comparing over 100 years of records. The Spring was especially cool with the last frost occurring on June 8 th compared to the average date of May 13 th. This delayed development of crops in the early Spring and a cooler than normal summer was fortunately followed by a very warm and dry September that helped ripen crops and facilitate harvest of winter wheat and spring cereal crops.

The Fargo area of south eastern North Dakota experienced a slightly cooler than normal year, although precipitation was 17% above normal values. The fall of 2009 was one of the warmest on record that helped crops, especially corn, ripen. However, rainfall was 2.7 in. above normal much coming in the late fall and did not facilitate timely harvesting.

The Olds area of south central Alberta experienced cooler than normal April and early May temperatures and the growing season had lower than normal growing degree days until the warmer than average September temperatures resulted in accumulated growing degree days to equal and then exceed 30-year averages by the middle of September (see Figure 1).

Figure 1. Accumulated Growing Degree Days (5 oC base), Olds, Alberta, 30-April through to 30-September, 2009. (Source: Alberta Agriculture and Rural Development).

The Brandon area of south west Manitoba experienced only slightly less than normal precipitation – 331 mm compared to 353 mm (13 in. compared to 14 in.), but the growing degree days (5 oC) were 6% less than an average year during the growing season.

When considering the whole NGP region – consisting of the states of Montana and North Dakota, and the provinces of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba – the cropping year 2009 was especially cool in the spring and had below average summer temperatures. If there had not been warmer than normal temperatures in September and October, many of the region’s crops would not have reached maturity. Some areas, especially in the west from north-central Montana up into Alberta and the west-central part of Saskatchewan, experienced very low spring precipitation (bordering on severe drought) that resulted in poor germination and emergence of crops, especially the small-seeded oilseed crops including canola, mustard, and flax. When rains came in late June, a problem of delayed germination and emergence happened in many of these fields that caused uneven ripening of crops in the fall and delayed harvest operations. Much of the drought-affected areas received below average total growing season precipitation. It was observed, however, that final crop yields were amazingly good even though below average. These reasonable yields were possible because of the lower moisture stress due to the cooler summer temperatures. Had the normal hot summer temperatures commonly experienced happened, many of the crops would have failed due to moisture stress. Some sugar beet fields in the region were not harvested because of delayed operations due to warmer than normal September and early October temperatures, followed by enough precipitation to hamper harvesting and then crops being frozen in the field. A similar situation happened for corn fields and the delayed harvest along with moist conditions resulted in rotting of grain in the ears. Many of these sugar beet and corn fields will be tilled under during spring field operations. Adjustments will be needed for subsequent crops on these fields as the nutrients usually removed in the harvested parts of the crops remained in the field and will become available as the crop residues decompose. Even though some areas had lower than average yields, much of the NGP region had average to above average crop yields and if it was an area that didn’t received untimely rain at harvest the grain quality harvested was good to excellent.

Now the big question is what will the cropping season of 2010 be like? Hopefully a more normal and warmer spring season. Seasonal predictions for the NGP are that the temperatures will be a bit warmer than normal and this will be a nice change from the spring of 2009. Precipitation looks to be close to normal amounts. Summer temperatures are expected to be higher than average on the west side of the region, accompanied by average precipitation. In most areas, residual N, P, and K in soils seems to be lower than normal, and fertilizer rates will need to be somewhat greater than normal to meet optimal crop yield targets. Some spring soil sampling and testing is advised on fields to help fine tune nutrient rates, especially for N.