The Rural Voice, 2005-05, Page 42Advice
Erb gives tips to boost soybean yields
It should be possible to get a 65 -
bushel soybean yield in Huron
County and crop adviser Mervyn Erb
has nine tips for producers to
increase their yields.
The biggest challenge for
producers wanting to improve yields
is being willing to examine their own
methods.
"People would rather change
equipment brands than methods and
procedures," Erb told 60 producers
attending the Huron County Crop
Improvement Association's
Production Day in Blyth, March 22.
"That takes self-evaluation and we
' guys don't do self-evaluation very
well."
There needs to be more focus on
the soil, which Erb called "the
stomach of the plant". The best yields
among his customers at Agri -Solve
have always come from livestock
farmers who use manure.
"Know your dirt," he said. He
admitted helping farmers "mine"
their soil in the last decade to try to
squeeze profit out of their operation
when commodity prices were low.
Now when there's no profit to be
made at all there isn't as much
residual nutrition in the soil as is
needed, he said. As a result if farmers
try to squeeze too much out of too
few fertilizer inputs the yield may be
hurt. Test your soil to know what
fertility levels are so you can know if
skimping will cost you lost yields, he
advised.
Looking at soybeans, he said starter
fertilizers might barely pay for the
cost of the fertilizer. Innoculants,
however, do pay for themselves.
Good drainage in fields is needed
for maximum bean yield, he said.
The soil structure can still play a role
in whether a tiled field drains
properly.
Soil conditions are more important
than planting date for good yields.
"The best yields are (for crops
planted) in early May but conditions
have to be right. Don't stick beans
into cold ground. It's better to plant
late into warm ground. I don't know
how to get 65 -bushel beans but I sure
know a recipe for disaster."
38 THE RURAL VOICE
When beans are planted into cold
ground the first moisture they absorb
is cold and this can damage
germination causing uneven
germination or no germination at all.
If the soil is warm for the first hours
after planting, the seed will absorb
warm moisture and even if the
weather and soil turns cold later, the
germination will still be better.
Erb said he found only subtle
differences between no -till or
moldboard plowing tillage systems.
The key to no -till is that the seed
needs a good root bed, he said.
With pests, Erb said there are
predictions that this will be a bad
year for aphids because there were so
many aphids on other hosts like
buckthorn when winter arrived. The
extreme cold of some parts of the
winter may have resulted in some
reduction in the population but
"we're expecting a huge problem this
year."
Timely spraying of aphids can
result in good yield increases because
the size of the beans increases.
If there is enough moisture,
production is not severely diminished
by weed pressure, he said.
He urged farmers to be careful in
selecting seed. There are 256
varieties of soybean seed. Of these
114 are pretty good but there are 47
that will give the best yields. "If you
want to boost your yield, choose the
very best varieties."
There's a yield advantage of 1.5 to
1.75 bushels per acre for
conventional varieties over Round -
Up Ready varieties, Erb said, but the
genetically -modified variety may
gain back about .7 bushels in better
stress tolerance. As well, Roundup
Ready varieties are improving.
Erb advised producers to evaluate a
few new concepts every year but to
do that you need good records, he
said.
"Manage for results. If you can't
measure it, you can't manage it."
Agriculture, he said, is site specific.
You need to look at your practices.0
Highest corn yield not most
economical, Greg Stewart says
Continued from page 37
red clover has a credit of 82 (if
plowed, no -till's credit for clover is
just 67).
The rate of nitrogen application
must increase as the number of crop
heat units increases, Stewart said.
"There's a 30 pound difference as
you move from lower to higher heat
units."
Soil texture also affects the need
for nitrogen fertilizer. Silt loam is the
most productive with the least
addition of fertilizer. As you move
toward clay in one direction or sand
in the other, the nitrogen
requirements can increase by as
much as 30 pounds.
Application with a side -dressing of
nitrogen can be as much as 20 per
cent more efficient than preplanted
but again the soil texture counts.
Side -dressing delivers 100 per cent
of preplant rates in high sand soils,
90 per cent in intermediate sand and
80 per cent in low sand soils.
"It's the opposite of what it would
seem," Stewart said. "You'd think
you would lose more in sandy
ground."
Stewart's calculator also adjusts
application rates according to corn
prices to deliver the most economical
yield.
"The more we looked at it (corn
price), the more we realized that it
had to be considered," Stewart said.
In his calculation if the price of corn
remained stable at $3 per bushel and
the price of nitrogen increased from
27 to 43 cents a pound, the
economical application rate dropped
by 21 kg per hectare.
Stewart tested the calculator on 72
fields and found it came close to the
ideal nitrogen application rate.
It's important to know the
composition of your soil before you
try to use the calculator, Stewart
said.0