September 20, 2021 Edition
“If you torture the statistician long enough, they’ll massage
the numbers to tell any story you would like!”
This quote is very similar to my last update and further emphasizes
the message that numbers can tell a variety of stories. At the end of the day, we need to consider
the source, the circumstances (environment), as well as any personal experiences
before making an individual judgement. This
harvest, there will be the usual amount of data, but we should all be cognizant
of the stress conditions before making too many conclusions despite how the
data looks and feels.
Over the past couple weeks, a few questions are common to
area farm producers and thus I’ll place these topics together in no particular
order: corn development and weather, soybean seed quality, combine settings, and
the potential future of dicamba. As
usual, we’ll try to keep the commentary to a minimum and let the data try to
tell an accurate story.
Corn
Development and Growing Degree Day (heat unit) accumulation:
We’ll continue to reference the NDAWN (North Dakota
Agricultural Weather Network) system for weather and GDD data with an average
start date for corn planting this year of May 5th. For the fields that were planted about 7-10
days earlier, we can add 30-50 GDD’s, and conversely for fields planted 7-10
days later we can subtract about 40-60 GDD’s.
The first figure below reveals GDD’s in our region to date.
Without a killing frost yet this autumn, nor any frost
forecasted in the 10-day picture, we are sitting in a spot where corn has mainly
reached physiological maturity and is drying down quickly (GDD map below). Within Pioneer’s 80-90 RM zone of corn
hybrids, we’ll typically need about 2000-2100 growing degree days to achieve
physiological maturity, or black layer, from the time of planting. However, please realize that there is no
industry standard for GDD ratings on corn hybrids and GDD numbers can
drastically change from one seed brand to another for a certain CRM zone.
The late rainfall has provided better conditions for the
corn crop to maintain stalk strength in most fields, but the extreme dry conditions
during pollination have caused some erratic pollination. Ears with poor pollination (especially at the
base end of the ear) do affect ear-shank development and thus are more susceptible
to ear drop (ear-shank fails closer to the main stalk resulting in ear with husks
dropping from the plant) and ear slip (ear-shank fails at the very base of the
corn cob resulting in the ear slipping-out with the husks remaining on the
plant). Currently, it’s an excellent
time to monitor corn fields and assess grain moisture content as well as
ear-shank integrity to place a harvest priority on fields.
As the combines are currently testing a bit of corn in the
region, we have heard reports of corn grain moisture content in the low 20’s
and upper teens for moisture. With a
good 10 days remaining in the month of September, and sugarbeet harvest quickly
approaching, we should consider all ideas in our plan to get the corn harvested
efficiently and effectively as possible.
Many fields of corn were planted after the soybeans this
particular year. Maybe the trend of
switching the traditional sequence during the harvest window is adequate as
well in some cases.
https://corteva.showpad.biz/harvest-timing-affect-on-corn-yields
https://corteva.showpad.biz/managing-corn-ear-drop
Soybean harvest
Soybean harvest progress is nearing a third to half complete
in some areas, while just barely starting in others across the far northern
plains. With the inconsistent weather,
we are seeing and hearing a wide range of variability in yields and seed quality.
Pod integrity in general is declining on our soybeans as
well. The stress of the drought during the
season and now the wetting and drying of pods is heightening the issue. Thankfully, it looks like a dry 10-day
forecast; we should be able to harvest a majority of the soybean and some of the corn crop.
https://corteva.showpad.biz/pod-shattering-soybeans
Dicamba
With all the injured soybeans
in the region (and across the US) this summer, the thoughts naturally shifted
to what the future of dicamba could and should look like. I’ll refrain from commentary on the topic but
thought you would be interested in seeing this report from the EPA and the
Office of the Inspector General. This
report is dated May 24, 2021 and dives into some broader aspects of the EPA and
fulfilling its overall “mission to protect human health and the environment”.
With myself being a
Corteva employee and our company formerly marketing a dicamba product (Fexepan®), I’ll have to leave
further reading and interpretation to you on the topic. I included a link to the direct report below.
Late Season Rainfall
With my last note critiquing the lack of rain across the
region, we have now seen some consistent precipitation occur and continue to
remain in our weekly forecasts. For the
last 30 days, here are the precipitation totals for our region.
Combine Settings – drought stressed crops
Well, I don’t
know about you, but I’ve seen enough drought impacted crops this August and September
with variable kernel sizes to know that getting a harvester set to efficiently
and effectively thrash the crop will be a good challenge this autumn. Luckily, we have some great resources to help
with the task!
To dial in the combine, it’s important to understand where damage and/or loss occurs as the grain moves through the machine.
Feeding Components
- Don’t blame the concave or
rotor for all the grain damage you see in the tank. Look at the kernels to
see how they were damaged to determine adjustments. Feeder house drums set too low or
conveyor chains running too loose can increase grain damage. Set all
components as directed in the owner’s manual. – Darrell Smith, AgWeb
machinery editor, and Jeff Gray, product
coordinator, Claas Lexion
- Some grain damage occurs far
in front of the concave and rotor. In corn, if the header cross-augers are
positioned too high, the flighting can pinch and scrape the tops of
kernels as ears are augured toward the feeder house. Lower the cross-auger to reduce
“top-tipped” kernels. – Kelly Kravig, Case IH harvest marketing manager
- Insure the cross-auger
in the header is square from left to right in its height above the
platform as well as in its depth (front to back) from the rear of the
header – a square header auger is essential to create a consistent crop
flow into the combine’s feeder house. – John Aubin, Combine Harvest
Solutions
- Also, for corn,
make sure the deck plates are slightly wider apart at the rear (top) of
the deck plates versus the front (bottom).
This will ensure the rollers will more efficiently pull the stalk
through and therefore more effectively managing the residue with
potentially less stalk material having to move through the combine.
Threshing Elements
- Once the feeding adjustments
are appropriate, cracked or broken corn kernels suggest threshing elements
are smashing the kernels off the cobs rather than rubbing and rolling them
off
- For corn, the
initial setting for the concave should match the diameter of a thrashed cob
in millimeters. In this example
(pic), the measurement is about 23 mm
- Before further adjustments,
reduce threshing speed until grain damage is minimized, then tighten the
concave clearance if un-thrashed grain remains on the cobs
- The optimum distance between
the threshing elements and the surface of the concave is slightly wider
than the diameter of an average corn cob (shelled) from the particular
field
- It’s easy when experimenting
with concave settings to overtighten and end up with a lot of pieces of
cobs in the grain tank. If there are excessive cobs in the tank, there are
probably broken cobs stuck in the sieves – thus open the concaves
- Often, the first response is
to close the chaffer to clean the grain sample. Closing the chaffer from
the cab, with chunks of cobs stuck between the louvers, can bend the
louvers and damage the adjusting mechanism. Therefore, manually clean the louvers so
the adjusting mechanism can move freely.
Cleaning Fans
- Be sure to run cleaning fans
near top speed. Air is the
lubricant that lifts and floats crop material across the chaffer and
sieve. Without enough air, the
shaking motion of the sieves will pack the material into a dense mat,
trapping the grain and carrying it out the back of the combine. – Jeff
Gray (Lexion)
General
- It’s a good practice to double check and potentially re-calibrate electronic measurement displays in the cab regarding combine settings. Some technicians state that an electronic display can easily be off by a significant percentage and therefore could be the actual cause of excess grain loss – despite the operator thinking the particular setting is spot-on (thus should not be adjusted any further)
https://www.agprofessional.com/article/adjust-your-combine-reduce-damage-high-moisture-corn https://www.pioneer.com/us/agronomy/combine-settings-corn-drought-cropfocus.html
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