Farmers took full advantage of the windy, hot weather this week to chip away at harvest. They had about three-quarters of the province’s crop in their bins just as October arrived with a cooler, wetter forecast.

But it hasn’t been easy, as evidenced by the deeply rutted fields in areas that received heavy rains two weeks ago. There has been no shortage of anecdotal reports of “rescue” operations, where an individual operation’s harvest was waylaid by the need to extract equipment mired in the mud.

Wet soils beneath a thick canopy of ripe crops also add up to quality losses. While much of the early cereals harvested this fall have ranked in the top grades, some fields where harvest was delayed by rain resulted in grain that was downgraded to livestock feed, which is a major hit on pricing.

The unusually warm day and night-time temperatures have also created headaches harvesting potatoes. The optimum temperature range for putting potatoes into storage is between 7 C and 15 C. Harvest when spuds are too cold and they bruise; storing them when they are too warm increases the risk of diseases that cause rot. At this time of year, the shift from one extreme to the other can happen overnight, so the window of opportunity is narrow.

Canadian farmers are understandably disappointed the federal government’s response to China’s punishing import tariffs on canola, pork, peas and seafood hasn’t so far included direct compensation.

After all, the duties are widely seen as retaliation for Canadian tariffs effectively locking Chinese electric cars out of the local market — a policy decision that had nothing to do with agriculture. This is the second time in recent memory China has targeted Canadian farmers to score points on unrelated issues. It’s unlikely to be the last.

While the full impact remains unclear, when Canada’s second-largest canola customer imposes tariffs of 75.8 per cent on seed and 100 per cent on oil and meal, it’s a safe bet demand will be curbed and prices will be lower than they would have been otherwise. Industry estimates place the eventual costs in the range of $2 billion.

However, commodity prices this year are depressed across the board — for a host of reasons. Much of the new-crop canola has yet to be harvested and very little has been sold.