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Moving grain focus of U of S summit

Solutions on how to improve grain transportation efficiency to get Canadian crops to market and the problems farmers, grain handlers, railways, port terminals and government face during increased grain production was the focus of a recent University of Saskatchewan grain summit.

The Grain Handling and Transportation Summit 2014 held March 26 at the Saskatoon Inn and hosted by the Department of Bioresource Policy, Business and Economics (BPBE) in the College of Agriculture and Bioresources at the U of S brought together a wide range of stakeholders and experts to share information and discuss the current state of grain movement, price and income prognosis and any possible short- and long-term solutions to the current crisis.

“The idea of the conference was to provide a broad overview of the situation and to start to talk about solutions to the issues in a very broad conversation and not get preoccupied with trying to fix this quickly,” said Richard Gray, a U of S agriculture professor who helped organize the grain summit. Gray spoke on “Policy Options to Reduce the Basis” as part of session three of the conference titled “Markets and Policy Solutions.”

The day-long summit also featured sessions on “The Status of the Grain Transportation System,” “Shipper Agreements and Other Logistical Solutions” and lastly “Next Steps for Engagement and Finding Solutions.”

Gray said one of the factors that contributed to this year’s crisis that he highlighted in his talk is the need for a much better public forecasting of crops. He said farmers are now asked what they think is in the field either after harvest or before and in the past couple years those estimates were off by a long shot.

He said this has contributed to this year’s problem because railways weren’t anticipating the 2013 crop and didn’t become aware of it until September. Gray said that isn’t good enough notice for the railways to have sufficient crews hired, among other things, to handle it.

Another “issue that I brought up was the need for greater West Coast capacity,” he said, noting capacity at West Coast terminals is just over 20 million tonnes, while this year’s crop that needs to be exported to the most important market of Asia comes in at over 50 million tonnes. “Even if we did fix the rail situation tomorrow we wouldn’t be able to move it through the West Coast. There would be a lot of grain that would have to move east or all the way south to the Gulf of Mexico in order to hit salt water and then you’re hitting salt water in a market that is saturated with grain.”

Ian McCreary, a graduate of the Dept. of BPBE at the U of S and a former Canadian Wheat Board director, said his talk during session four of the conference presented an overview of this “central problem” of limited West Coast capacity and the lack of coordination that is causing everyone to try to ship through that coast. He said a discussion then followed about what could be learned from how the CWB would have handled it and finally some ideas were presented that could be considered as part of a solution.

To read more please see the April 7 print edition of The Davidson Leader.

Sports

Cougars, Kodiaks and Raiders gear up for playoffs

The Davidson Raiders, Craik Cougars and Kenaston Kodiaks junior badminton teams are gearing up for sectionals and inter-sectionals this week after a whirlwind season of fun and determined play.

Allison de Hoop, coach of the Kodiaks junior badminton team, said her goal is for the team to play hard and improve their skills at inter-sectionals April 10 in Loreburn while continuing to display good sportsmanship. She said the games the 13-member team has played so far this year, including a mini-tournament last Monday in Davidson between the three schools, were just for practice and no score was taken, but that is going to change this Thursday.

de Hoop said the games the Kodiaks boys and girls singles, doubles and mixed doubles teams would be playing at inter-sectionals will be marked, with the winner moving on to sectionals April 15 at Kenaston. The winners from those games move on to districts held early next month, but de Hoop said just getting better at the game right now is more important than the final score.

“I like badminton because you have to think about it when you’re playing and you’ve got to think about how your opponent is playing, so it gets the mind and body working together,” said de Hoop. “If they’re playing doubles they are also playing with a teammate, so they are learning how to cooperate with that other person and (figure out) when it is their turn to hit and when it is the other person’s turn. They are learning some good cooperation skills and how to be a good sport.”

Jody Kearns, coach of the Cougars bantam badminton team, said Craik’s playoff schedule is different from Kenaston and Davidson because they are in the Prairie South School Division, so her team will actually be competing in sectionals this Thursday at Caronport. She said the team of 14 kids has had a busy year up to this date practising against “some good competition” in an effort to build up their skills.

“We’re a young team,” said Kearns, noting most of the kids heading to Caronport are in either Grade 7 or 8. “It’s not necessarily about winning and losing. It’ll be the first time for some Grade 7s going to a big tournament. This is just to gain experience.”

Raiders coach Kristin Dolman said the 18 kids on the Davidson team have gotten together with a few different schools in their short season as a way to get kids practising the sport in a game situation.

“It’s a really good sport for someone who likes to play (individually, as) it allows them to excel and not rely on anyone else,” said Dolman. “It involves a lot of coordination and it actually can turn out to be a really fast-paced intense game.”

Davidson

Guild pieces together 10 years

The Prairie Patches Quilt Guild is celebrating its 10th anniversary and to mark the occasion they are inviting everyone to come to Davidson Town Hall this weekend for a colourful and interesting quilt show.

“We have just under 150 items this year that are going to be on display,” said Cathy Palmer, a member of the Prairie Patches Quilt Guild. “We are just really excited about that because this will be the biggest show we’ve had. There will be a variety of things on display from a very large king-sized quilt all the way down to lap and baby quilts as well as many smaller items that are done like little table runners and place mats and thread-painted pictures.

“Our members have really gotten to be quite diverse now in their skills and interests and so I think our community will be quite amazed at what they’ll see this year.”

In addition to the Quilt Guild member’s work, the show will also feature vendor’s booths on Saturday from Quilters Haven of Moose Jaw and 4-40 Quilt Shop out of Saskatoon. The two booths are going to be offering fabrics and patterns for sale among other things and will also be holding various demonstrations throughout the day on different quilting topics.

Palmer said Saskatoon artist Elizabeth Muirhead is also appearing at the Town Hall on Saturday to showcase her “unique” and “absolutely stunning” wool felting projects. She said the show is for everyone who enjoys art and looking at beautiful things, so people don’t have to be quilters to attend.

“Whether you’re a painter, wood-worker or stained-glass hobbyist, there is many similarities in the work we do,” she said. “We are just working with a different medium.”

The Prairie Patches Quilt Guild formed in December 2003 when 14 ladies joined together for fellowship, fun and a desire to quilt. Over the years the Guild has been very active in the town by donating many pieces to be used as prizes for the benefit of various community charities.

“We have kept a photo album as sort of an archives of what we’ve done over the years and that photo album is really kind of interesting to look back at on our work in 2003 and how it’s evolved to 2014,” said Palmer, noting the Guild now has 19 members from Davidson and area who meet twice a month at the Pentecostal Church. “Our skills and our confidence and our expertise have certainly come a long way.”

Palmer said these skills are going to be on display beginning this Friday evening when they hold a “sneak-a-peek” for interested people who cannot make it to the Saturday show. She said those people who do make it to the Town Hall on Saturday will have an added benefit of attending as the Guild is holding an all-day lunch including “to die for” homemade pies at the show.

“We’ve got a group of men that come out and help us in the morning set up our big stands for the displays,” said Palmer. “We couldn’t set up without them because it’s really heavy, but I’ve heard some of them say they also come for the pie.”

The Quilt Show sneak-a-peek runs from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Friday and the main show goes from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday. A silver collection donation is appreciated.

featured

Davidson dentist completes charity mission

Dr. Abe Chaukla exemplified kindness in action earlier this month when he travelled to Central America to perform needed dental work on poor sugarcane farmers.

Chaukla, a dentist at the Davidson Dental practice on Washington Avenue, volunteered to join the charitable organization Kindness in Action dental brigade for their March 1 to 9 mission to Esteli, Nicaragua, to work in a sweaty, suction-less and bloody triage dental clinic. He said the experience was so rewarding that he plans to make it an annual humanitarian expedition.

“It’s my first exposure to a dental charitable mission and I was quite moved by it,” said Chaukla, noting he joined the Alberta-based dental charity after learning about it from a former colleague with the Canadian Forces. “I felt like it kind of put my own job in perspective and also it was a good experience to see your work in different countries and the difference you make in their lives.”

While wearing his Saskatchewan Roughriders grubs, Chaukla endured hot and humid weather along with limited dental equipment to perform the emergency work. He said the time spent in the makeshift Esteli dental clinic was difficult and the work was heavy, but the team of Canadian dentists, dental hygienists, nurses and helpers got the job done.

“All the things we use here are taken for granted, but I still was able to pull almost 200 teeth in three days and do a tonne of fillings,” he said. “We were limited in equipment there too. Basically everything was triage. People lined up for…it went around the block. Everything we did was on a visual exam, so if we looked in somebody’s mouth and something really needed to be extracted we did that. If there were fillings to be done, we did that.”

Chaukla said Kindness in Action had his working vacation ready as soon as he touched down in Nicaragua’s tropical capital city of Managua after flying out of the bitter cold of a March 1 day on the Canadian Prairies. He said the volunteer-based dental charity had already completed work on the ground in Esteli to set up bus drivers, tour guides, translators and a supply team for the dental brigade to get right to the business of relieving pain for the greatest number of people possible.

To read more please see the March 31 print edition of The Davidson Leader.

Sports

Kodiaks strong season comes to an end

The Kenaston Kodiaks senior girls basketball team was defeated in the gold medal game at Hoopla earlier this month, but they still can say they enjoyed a great season.

“We as a team talk about it a lot that we won’t base our feelings on whether we’ve had a successful year or not on our last game,” said Kodiaks coach Gene Zdunich. “We beat all the top 3A teams and both of the top 2A teams and we know we had a successful year.”

The Kodiaks lost the last game 57-52 to the Middle Lake Avengers March 15 at Winston Knoll Collegiate in Regina. The Middle Lake win avenged their 51-38 loss to Kenaston in the gold medal game at Hoopla one year ago.

Zdunich said between those two gold medal finals the two teams have played against each other five times with the Kodiaks winning three of those games. He said other than one game where the Avengers were short players and Kenaston trounced them by over 20 points, each of the matches were really close.

“The other games were all decided by five or six or seven points, so when they’re that close against a team that is as good as them and (between) two teams that are as competitive as we are it can go either way,” he said. “We knew that too. It wasn’t a complete surprise that if we didn’t play well they would win.”

Kenaston came out slow in the gold medal final and fell behind Middle Lake heading into the half. A third quarter surge pulled the Kodiaks ahead briefly, but a lack of scoring touch sealed their fate as the Avengers once again took the lead and held on for the five-point win.

“We just never finished as good as we can,” said Zdunich. “I don’t think there was any real turning point. They were just a good team and we needed to play a little better. We knew that if we didn’t play our best we were going to be in trouble and we didn’t play our best.”

The young Kodiaks team, which includes one Grade 12, three Grade 11s, three Grade 9s and four Grade 8s, made it to the gold medal game with a 72-60 win over the Kinistino Blues one day earlier at Hoopla. The hard-working club advanced to the provincial championships by beating the Turtleford Titans 90-26 and the Wilkie Broncs 67-43 one week earlier at regional playoffs held in Kenaston, which followed a 85-23 win over the Central Butte Bulldogs March 1 at the conference playoffs in Central Butte.

Zdunich said with so many returning players he expects the Kodiaks to be strong again next season. He said they hopefully will get another shot at the gold medal, but the aim is to just get better at the game and enjoy their time on the court.

“If we improve every week during the season we feel like we’re successful,” he said. “Our number one goal is our girls have got to have fun. We try and make sure they’re smiling.”

Davidson

Talented artists delight crowd at Music Festival Grand Finale

A large group of talented performers from Craik, Elbow, Loreburn, Bladworth and Davidson entertained a delighted crowd of spectators last Wednesday at the Central Saskatchewan Music Festival Grand Finale held in Davidson’s Parish Hall.

Davidson Mayor Clayton Schneider welcomed the young musicians and speech artists along with an eager throng of family and friends at the beginning of the evening by reciting a Music Festival story involving his family. Schneider said his son Noah approached him a day earlier to express his nervousness of playing the guitar in front of a crowd, as he’s only a beginner with the instrument.

Schneider said he told his son that nervousness ‘is a sign that you’re pushing yourself, it’s a sign that you’re growing.’ He added it is the same with all the brave performers who took the stage during the 54th Annual Central Saskatchewan Music Festival.

“This teaches kids how to grow as individuals,” he told the crowd. “It is lessons like this that the Town of Davidson will always support.”

The Davidson School Kindergarten class kicked off the Grand Finale performances with the songs “Rise and Shine” and “Four Hugs a Day.” The song-and-dance numbers thrilled the crowd of appreciative parents and grandparents and even had one young girl dancing along in the middle aisle.

A piano duet of “Rhythm and Boogie” by Elbow’s Emmitt Hundeby and Baylee Batza followed before Hayla Herback jumped on stage to play “The Balloon Man and Stepping Up and Down.” The first of many speech arts performances followed when Rhett Gust told the funny tale of “I Eat Kids Yum!  Yum!” that helped earn the performer two scores of 93 during the judging part of the three-day festival.

“We have to thank the ladies (Linda Haas, Laura Willner and Arlene Low) who were instrumental getting speech arts going in Davidson School,” said Grand Finale emcee Sharon Riecken.

Baylee then took the stage again to perform “Carefree Boogie,” which was followed by Craik’s Cohen Ter Heide playing a wonderful piano solo of “Spooks.” The guitar duo of Gavin Arend and Noah Schneider followed with the tune “Love Somebody” before Noah left the stage for Rosa Lee to come up and help Gavin play “When the Saints Go Marching In.”

Loreburn’s Nicole Yakimoski then sang a great rendition of “My Favorite Things” from “The Sound of Music” that came before first-time violinist Stephanie Elliott played “Au Clair de la Lune,” Jasmine Hundeby performed “Big Teddy Little Teddy” and Davidson’s Bailey Smith cracked up the crowd with “Bad Case of the Giggles.”

“We had so much talent in our speech arts this year it was unbelievable,” said Riecken after Bailey’s show, noting the young artist received a score of 90 during adjudication.

To read more please see the March 31 print edition of The Davidson Leader.