Dryer and warmer weather in the past week has allowed Weyburn area farmers to start getting into their fields in the past week.

Seeding progress has increased to approximately 8-10 per cent in the past week overall, estimated Elaine Moats, extension agrologist, adding a lot of field preparation work was also done this week.

"Some people have a fairly significant amount crop into the ground, particularly ones you'd like to get in early, like peas and lentils. Some made significant progress; there's also a large number who haven't begun seeding yet," said Moats.

She added there is a lot of field preparation work going on this year, such as pre-seeding tillage, more than in most recent years, along with early spraying for weeds.

"For a lot of people fields were too wet to get into last week. There has been a significant amount of drying this week with a return to field work. We're still not making huge progress to where we would normally be at ," said the agrologist.

Breaking the crop district down to where the most progress has taken place, Moats noted the area from Trossachs to Radville is probably the furthest ahead in seeding progress, with some of that dictated by the type of soil in that region.

"They will go from a point of being too wet to seed, to the ground being too hard to get a seed drill into, in a short space of time," said Moats, adding that for most farmers, it depends on the lay of their land in relation to moisture, and how many acres they have to seed. People who have large tracts of land to do may be more aggressive with getting the seed into the ground.

The weekend saw some very cool temperatures of a few degrees below zero, but Moats said it's fairly early in the season for there to be much effect.

"The soil can act as a bit of a buffer. The cool weather may have an effect on some of the crops that are just emerging. Canola and flax can take a few degrees of frost, and peas and lentils can take frost damage. They have the ability to grow back if there's any damage that kills the top part of the plant," she said.

Cereal grains like winter wheat or fall rye are fairly tough, and at this early stage are most leafy with no seeds starting to form as yet.

Overall, Moats felt there was good progress made this week with producers hitting the fields for either pre-seeding or seeding work.