The southeast region was generally warm and dry for the past week, enabling farmers to continue with their harvest progress, with 67 per cent of the crop now combined, and a further 19 per cent lying in swath or ready for straight-combining.

Crops that are at least 80 per cent done include early-seeded varieties like fall rye, winter wheat, peas, lentils, triticale and mustard.

Provincially, the harvest is 76 per cent complete, behind the five-year average of 91 per cent by this time in October. The southeast area is the furthest behind of all areas in the province currently.

For Weyburn-area farmer Don Pulfer, the weather was definitely a boon, as by Thursday he had most of his crops done. With the weather holding out over the long weekend, he estimated he could be all finished for the year by the middle of this week.

Last week he had combined 350 acres of canaryseed, with some canaryseed and flax remaining to be done. While the canaryseed came through this summer's weather quite well, the flax did not as it was particularly hit by the August frost.

Further west in the Ogema area, farmer Lonny McKague has not had a good time of it, and hopes the nice weather so far will keep on towards the end of October.

The biggest factor for him was the big snowstorm of May 10-11; what was seeded prior to the storm did well, and has mostly come off in good shape. The crops seeded after that, however, weren't in the ground until some 23 days after the storm, and McKague only began harvesting those crops on Monday.

The early crops, peas and canola, had good yield and good quality, but with two-thirds of the crop left to do, the quality is expected to take a big hit. His remaining crops include durum, oats and some canola.

"The little bit I did on Monday was good, but the majority of it will be feed durum. The late canola has abnormally high green count. The weather of the last week helped a lot, but it still needs more than a week of this weather, and another week after that to get it combined," said McKague, noting while some people in his area are done, many others are in the same boat he is.

"There will be people not done by November, even if the weather holds. There are lots of combines going today (Tuesday)," he said.

With the drier weather, the topsoil moisture is also decreasing, according to crop reporters in the southeast, with 46 per cent saying moisture is adequate, compared to 67 per cent last week. On hay and pasture land, 43 per cent of reporters said the moisture was adequate, and 57 per cent said moisture is short or very short.

Fall-seeded crops are being damaged by grasshoppers, and migrating waterfowl are also causing some damages in the northern part of Crop District 2.