FORTUNE COVE – Prince Edward Island might be small, but it can offer up a mixed bag of weather at different places in the province at the same time. Just ask a potato grower.
St. Louis and area grower, Francis Shea, said the extreme western part of the province suffered through a very dry summer.
“The O’Leary area was getting rain; they were getting rains in the evening and we never got a drop up here,” he said.
That changed on Wednesday when the whole province got a generous soaking from Mother Nature.
“The Island’s small, but she’s got some weird weather patterns,” Shea acknowledged. He noted the O’Leary area is normally drier than the tip of the province, but that’s not the case this summer.
Shea said his crop received a welcomed 17 millimetres of rain on Wednesday. “I hope we get another shower this afternoon. I keep hoping,” he added in reference to a forecast giving a chance of thundershowers on Thursday.
Several kilometers to the east, Fortune Cove grower Barry Gallant said his crop is doing OK, having received enough rain to likely generate a good average yield this year.
The 21 ml that fell on his crop in Fortune Cove and the 32 ml that fell on his fields in the Foxley River area on Wednesday was needed moisture he said. The extra 11 ml in Foxley River was important, he said, because the soil is typically sandier there.
Pulling a stalk from a field near his home on Thursday, Gallant uncovered 13 small Russet Burbanks from nice, moist soil, the kind that, combined with the sun that was beating down, helps promote tuber growth. The spuds were still small, but Gallant said they should bulk up nicely during the next six weeks if the right weather conditions persist.
As much as he appreciated Wednesday’s rain, Gallant is aware it was even more badly needed in other areas of the province, including the Palmer Road area. “Someone said they only got 18 millimetres all summer there until yesterday,” he relayed.
“It never ceases to amaze me: what a small place P.E.I. is, but the weather patterns – this year, more than ever, rainfall has been the main limiting factor, but not for all areas,” commented P.E.I. Potato Board general manager, Greg Donald. He noted the O’Leary area, right over to the Potato Board’s Elite Seed Farm at Fox Island have had good growing conditions as have the extreme eastern end of the province.
The central section from Summerside to Kensington and from Borden across to Rustico, and the extreme western end of the province were all suffering from a shortage of rainfall until Wednesday.
He called it a good rain “steady and allowed lots of time for it to percolate down into the ground.”
Both Donald and Gallant suggested the later varieties, like the Russets, would survive the dry conditions better than some of the earlier varieties.
“Every day we didn’t have rain, no doubt, it was hurting our productivity and (raising) concerns on quality,” Donald suggested. “This rain was extremely welcomed and we’ll see in the next few weeks what it will bring us.”
While the early harvest for the Atlantic Canada fresh market has been happening for close to three weeks and new spuds have been going to the chip plant in Nova Scotia since last week, Donald said the main harvest is still a month away.
In the meantime, there is still some of last year’s crop heading off to be processed and to meet stores’ demand.
SOURCE: The Guardian
