With harvest well underway pests such as rats are a concern. It's good news that rodent numbers are not as high they were anticipated to be.

"The increase in rats and mice are not as significant as we thought they would be," says Ray Beck, Pest Control Officer. "In early spring we had a fair amount of mice activity, but the new bait stations, the safety bait stations that are pet proof and child proof work really good."

Rats can be a particularly troublesome pest on the farm. Rats have teeth that are continually growing so they are always needing to chew. This chewing can cause a problem for farm buildings, equipment and the harvested grain itself.

"We try to keep out numbers below 5% that's with the rat population because they're the main ones that we're after because they do the most damage, and plus rabies, plus people just don't like have rats and we've got them down to 3% province wide," says Beck.

Beck also informs that not all rodents should be considered pests. Foxes, for instance, keep rats and other rodents in check and their numbers are significantly up this year. Weasels are also up, which again can be very helpful animals except to those who have chickens.