Some Alberta farmers struggling after wet summer

Some Alberta farmers say they're getting too much of a good thing as a rainy summer has made harvesting crops a challenge.

Allison Ammeter grows peas in Sylvan Lake and says this growing season has been a little bittersweet.

• Crop production hit by dry weather in the east, wet weather in the west

"There's too much rain! Turn it off! Dry it up," she told CBC News with a laugh.

But the amount of the wet stuff is no laughing matter.

"Most of the province is struggling with too much of a good thing. We all like to see rain but most of the province has had too much rain and too much of it has come in late August when we would rather have nice, dry weather so we can be harvesting," she explained.

Ammeter said the ground, for many growers, is just too wet.

"It can affect the quality. At the beginning of August most of us thought we had some really excellent quality, now I am hearing average quality. For the most part there is pretty good quantity in a lot of places as long as the disease due to the rain has not held it back but harvest is behind because there has been too much rain and people can't get it off."

Parts of southern Alberta have seen more than twice as much rain as usual for this time of year.

The chairman of the Alberta Wheat Commission says despite the rain, production is about average because farmers were able to start growing early.

"We are all wanting to get into the fields and get harvesting but we are all being delayed at various points in our harvest. Some have got very little done so far this year just because of the all the rain," Kevin Auch said.

"And you know the crop is getting mature and getting ready to go and when we get rain at that time of year, it doesn't help us any. All it does at that point is, it reduces our quality."

He says that's important because lower quality grain isn't worth as much.

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