May 2, 2022 Edition

 

"You know that you don’t have a chance with this guy guarding me!” – Larry Bird, Boston Celtics player and Hall of Famer

 

On this night of NBA action in Hartford, CT in January of 1985, Larry Bird and the Celtics broke their timeout huddle late in the 4^th quarter with only a few seconds remaining in the game.  The Pistons had the lead by one point, but the Celtics had possession of the basketball.  As usual, Bird surveyed the situation and then freely gave Isiah Thomas (Pistons point guard with 33 points and 19 assists in the game) his thoughts on the developing situation.  Sure enough, Bird received the inbounds pass, took a couple dribbles along the left baseline and shot a running floater from 15 feet out as time expired.  Larry Bird not only had the game winning final basket, but also finished with a team high 32 points to go along with 10 rebounds and 5 assists.  Kent Benson had another below par game against Bird and Celtics with 8 points and 6 rebounds in 34 minutes of playing time.

https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198501290BOS.html

Just like Isiah Thomas, Kent Benson, and the Detroit Pistons, some folks may not give the farmers of the region much of a chance up here in the far northern plains this year.  It may seem like it’s late in the game for the planting season, but in reality, it’s only the first week of May.  There have been many years in the past where we have had to accept a starting date after May 10^th.  If we can just find a break in the weather to get the planters and air-seeders rolling, there is still plenty of time on the calendar to have a good growing season!

On the flip side, only the weather is keeping our local farmers contained as they are finding winning opportunities regardless of where they look for crop options.  Strong commodity prices across the board are providing a sound financial outlook for the year to nicely reward labor and management.

If you have any ideas for newsletter topics, feel free to reach-out for discussion.  As you can tell from my history of articles, most ideas are welcome.  This month’s list includes an update on the regional weather, micro-nutrients, and soil/crop amendments.

Weather

Obviously, it’s been very slow warm-up so far this spring.  We did build some optimism in mid-March with a fast snow melt, but since then we’ve had cooler than average temperatures and above average precipitation including that big snowstorm blizzard in mid-April.  Let’s take a look at area conditions and the forecast to help paint the picture to help with our planning.

With the rain over the weekend, the regions fields are once again saturated in eastern North Dakota and western Minnesota, and it’ll take a bit of time for the surface and tile drainage to dissipate the water despite warmer temperature forecasts into the 50s and 60s.  The following map reveals rainfall since April 1^st of this spring.  The wet area runs from Galesburg up to Finley in the east central part of N.D., while the drier areas remain to the west and north.

The soil temperature chart displayed below (^oFahrenheit) comes from NDAWN at 9 am Monday, May 2^nd.  I highlighted in blue any readings at or below 37F and gave the red highlights to any reading at or above 45F.  Unfortunately, many areas along US HWY #2 and north have very cold soil temperatures for early May.  The southwestern part of North Dakota has the warmest soil temps, but they have also received the close to 4” of rain over the last month.

For a summer season outlook, the “Severe Weather Europe” group published their 2022 northern hemisphere weather outlook at the end of April (https://www.severe-weather.eu/summer-forecast-2022-united-states-europe...).  They basically state that a continuing LaNina pattern will persist for the US and southern Canada, making our Midwest and Northern Plains regions warmer and drier than average for June-August.  With the abundant moisture our region has endured over the last 8 months we should be in a good spot to at least get the crop established and sustained for several weeks.  If we do experience drier and warmer than average conditions during the latter half of the summer, we have a good history of living off stored soil moisture and sporadic thunderstorms to obtain respectable yields.

With the calendar turning to May, and the current wet conditions meaning we won’t get a start in the field for probably another week or so, I wouldn’t fret too much about soil temperatures and/or cold fronts threatening further delays of planting.  By the time planting gets here, we will be into the warmer part of the spring with soil temperature building and able to recover quickly.  As field conditions become suitable, we should be in a good spot for successful germination and establishment of all crops.

 

Micronutrient Fertility

As we look to begin planting and finalizing our crop input plans for the season, it may be worth spending a few minutes on micronutrients and secondary macronutrients.  Some bullet points to consider:

·         Management of secondary macronutrients of sulfur, calcium and magnesium are probably more likely to provide a return-on-investment vs micronutrients in most field scenarios

·          Many of our fields have alkaline soil pH in the region and therefore provide lower plant availability of some nutrients because of the physical properties of soils with pH near 8.0 (Fig 3)

·         Micronutrients of Iron, Zinc Manganese and Boron have the most likely potential to be deficient in our region for corn, soybeans, sugarbeets and spring wheat (Table  4)

·         Zinc is a very common micronutrient added for corn production.  Many of our soils test low for zinc and the recommendation for corn is 1-2 total lbs/ac zinc in a starter fertilizer band depending on soil test values (U of Minn weblink here).  Several liquid crop fertility products do include zinc but be wary of concentration levels for certainty of obtaining the full 1-2 lbs of applied zinc recommendation.  For example, Riser® from Loveland (weblink here), is only 0.95% zinc with a weight of 10.56 lbs/gal.  Therefore, it would take 10 gal/ac of Riser® to get one full pound of zinc/ac applied (1.0 lbs Zn desired/10.56/0.0095).  Most recommendations would suggest an applied volume of 1-3 gal/ac range for Riser®.  Riser® is a great low salt, safe, liquid fertilizer product, but if you’re using it to as your only source of zinc in low testing soils, it’s questionable if the crop is receiving enough zinc supplement to meet the needs.

If you are looking to conduct a fertility trial on your farm (micros or secondary macros), or would be interested in evaluating some zinc fertility rates on your farm, please keep me posted and I would be willing to assist with some soil / tissue sampling and analysis of the data.

https://corteva.showpad.com/share/vsVFjIMhk9SQduhI2poXL

Crop Enhancer Products – to apply or not?

With today’s strong commodity prices, we are seeing more and more “2.5 gal jug” products hit the agriculture market promoting extra bushels through better soil health, better fertilizer utilization, better root stimulation, etc., etc., etc.  Obviously, this creates the age-old question – should I purchase and apply a crop growth promoting product, or is it just a waste of money? 

Just like in 2012/’13 with $7/bu corn, there is getting to be many of these products on the market.  It’s hard to stay informed and even more difficult to find the time to conduct adequate research on each product to gauge their financial benefit.  However, the research can be done, and Joe Lauer from the University of Wisconsin does a great job explaining his simple research and data on one of these types of products.  The data comes from one year and over 11 locations to determine there was no yield advantage to the applied product over the untreated check treatment.  Buyer beware!  http://wisccorn.blogspot.com/2013/05/035.html

Unfortunately, many of these crop enhancer products do not statistically prove their value on a consistent basis, and therefore our skepticism is raised when new products are presented because of unmet expectations on prior occasions.  However, we can’t dump all these products into the trash bin unconditionally because with today’s advancements in science, formulations and technology, we may just find a superior product that really does create tremendous value.

My recommendation is to proceed with caution at maximum if you experience the following common scenarios with crop/soil amendments:

·         The product of interest is being promoted with only pictures and/or customer testimonials stating differences on growth, health, and/or visual appearance.  Pictures and testimonials can be sexy, but do not guarantee extra yield or profitability

·         There is no multi-location or replicated research proving a yield advantage.  If the salesperson is so confident there will be a significant yield advantage with the product, then where is the independent third-party research proving the statement?

·         The product salesperson hesitates to engage on a plan to implement and execute over the growing season to determine a financial benefit on your farm and/or other farms within the region.  If there are less than 10-15 locations of treated versus untreated data, then a second and/or third year of testing should be implemented to gain additional insight and confidence in the performance of the product.

If you have any further questions, please reach-out to me and I would be more than willing to discuss the topic and assist in placing together a testing protocol to help determine the value of any product.