Signs of winter: keep snowmobiles off farm fields

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This article was published 06/01/2020 (2267 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Snoman Inc. has a message for anyone planning to hit the province’s groomed snowmobile trails this winter: stay off farmers’ fields.

More than 550 signs urging snowmobilers not to trespass on farmland are being distributed and put up by the non-profit Snowmobilers of Manitoba through its 53 clubs in the province.

The signs have been provided to Snoman free of charge by the Manitoba Agricultural Services Corp. and Farm Credit Canada.

“This is a new partnership and the reason for it is because of the rain we had this fall and that early October snowstorm. Due to that, a lot of crops got left in the field,” said Yvonne Rideout, Snoman executive director.

“You can damage those crops as soon as you go across a field. There are some areas where people don’t stay on the trail — we’ll be the first to admit that. But we always encourage riders to stay on the trail. You have to respect that someone’s livelihood is on the line.”

MASC president and chief executive officer Jared Munro said there’s at least 400,000 acres of field with unharvested crops in the province due heavy quantities of rain in the lead-up to winter.

“A number of these clients, some of whom will have insurance contracts with us, they’ll be waiting until the spring to make a decision on whether to harvest at that time. Certainly, the crops will degrade, but they can still be salvaged. Different crops respond differently to different weather conditions,” Munro said.

“When (Rideout) called with her suggestions about the signs, I just thought it was a great opportunity to create some awareness that there are still a lot of crops left out in the fields due to the late harvest we had in 2019.”

In total, Snoman has more than 12,000 kilometres of well-groomed trails throughout rural and northern Manitoba; up to 19,000 riders purchase a pass in a given year, granting them access to the trail system.

Snoman volunteers will be putting up the signs — which warn riders about crops left on the field and urges them to stick to the trails — as weather, snow and volunteer time permits.

“I worked in agriculture for over 23 years, so I know exactly what happens when you get an early storm such as the one in October. From reading the Manitoba Co-operator, and some of the coverage in the Free Press, I knew there were a lot of crops left in the field,” Rideout said.

“So we just wanted to do what we can to raise awareness about that, since farmers were already hit quite hard. It’s damaging to the crops as soon as a (snowmobile) goes across the field.”

MASC has a variety of insurance programs that insure farmers against crop losses due to weather-related incidents.

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @rk_thorpe