When it comes to spraying foliar fertilizers to aid crop growth, or spraying pesticides to control weeds, diseases, and insects; sprayer operators and farmers pay close attention to various factors affecting product performance. These factors may include the calibration of the equipment, application timing, label instructions and to some extent, the water volume. However, oftentimes hardly any attention is paid to water quality – even though water comprises over 95% of the spray solution.

The 2019 growing season started of dry across most of Western Canada and turned wet starting about mid-summer all the way through to winter snow fall, including an October blizzard in parts of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta. Now, over 4.2 million acres (2.5M in Saskatchewan; 1.6M in Alberta and over 260,000 in Manitoba) are still in the swath or standing in the field to-date in spring 2020.