Farmers and ranchers were interviewed over the past year for a mental health project organized by Saskatchewan Polytechnic and its research chair for rural health. Patient-advisors, with a background in agriculture, conducted those interviews.

Shari Laventure is a grain marketing specialist with Cargill and was one of those advisors. Laventure volunteered for the project as a way to help cope with the loss of her brother to suicide in 2015. She says no one knew he was struggling until it was too late.

There are lots of difficulties associated with being a rancher in a drought year. But many producers do not know about how high nitrate levels in feed can affect the cow’s ability to absorb vitamin A ...and its implications to calves. Dr. John Campbell with the University of Saskatchewan is a professor of large animal clinical sciences. He shared some of those concerns at the recent Saskatchewan Beef Industry Conference.

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