Tisdale Alfalfa Dehydration Gets Ready For Another Season

FTLComm - Tisdale - Wednesday, March 13, 2002

Twenty hooper cars East of the crossing and another group at the loading dock show that Tisdale Alfalfa Dehydration is getting some of its product to market. The 2001 harvest year was one of the poorest anyone remembers since alfalfa is a crop that depends on lots of moisture, last summer's drought was a disaster.

Last winter the dehydration worked through the winter turning its huge stockpile of bails into both pellets and cubes but this winter the equipment has stood idle with no bails to process. The Asian market had for more than a decade soaked up every bit of production that could be obtained from the five dehydration plants in this area but the downturn in their economy seen the demand for the product

shrivel as both Parkland and a smaller neighbouring plant closed their doors leaving the fields to Tisdale and Carrot River plants to stay in business. The climatic shift and continued strong demand for fattened cattle is seeing the domestic market brighten considerably and if the moisture comes this plant and its field equipment will be able to produce and sell to their heart's content.