No-Till Farmer Blog

I just got back to my hotel room after attending Agro-Culture Liquid Fertilizers’ Professional Liquid Fertilizer Program. I received the opportunity to address a crowd of about 250 folks, including the company’s area managers, on the subject of Responsible Nutrient Management.

Now, how you define Responsible Nutrient Management can mean many things, but in it’s simplest terms, I think it means being as efficient and effective as possible with your fertility program in a way that pays off economically and doesn’t negatively impact the environment.

There are a lot of farmers today who are doing a great job using the right rate of fertilizer at the right time and putting in a place that the crop can use. In fact, our No-Till Practices Survey showed that 59% of our subscribers are applying less than 1 pound of nitrogen per 1 bushel of targeted yield, with 17% applying less than 0.8 pounds of nitrogen per bushel. That’s pretty phenomenal when you consider in 1980 that farmers were applying 1.65 pounds of nitrogen per bushel of corn raised. Furthermore, only 13% apply fertilizer in the fall, while 40% apply spring pre-plant, 53% at-plant, 55% sidedress and 10% foliar.

Those are some positive signs that growers are making an effort to be as efficient and effective as possible with nitrogen without hurting their yield and profitability.

But there’s work to be done. You’ve got hypoxia in the Gulf of Mexico, phosphorus issues in the Chesapeake Bay, nitrates in the Des Moines River and the list goes on and on. Are farmers responsible for these ills? Yes, to a degree. But so can industry waste, sewerage runoff and residential lawn fertilizer runoff.

The problem for farmers and folks who work in the ag industry today is that they make up only about 1% of the U.S. population and there are folks who don’t understand ag and don’t want to take responsibility for their role in water ills. Instead, farmers tend to get all the blame.

So, there’s work to be done. We’ll keep looking to share the best fertility practices of no-tillers, and we hope you’ll keep looking to share your good practices with other farmers or perhaps with the people in your community who don’t understand agriculture very well.

We’d also encourage you to nominate any no-tillers whose fertility practices you admire for the Responsible Nutrient Management Practitioners Program. You can learn more at www.ResponsibleNutrients.com.

My wife, LuAnn, and I just completed a tour of Pennsylvania corn fields over 2000 miles to 26 farms. Pennsylvania has been a leader in no-till adoption and it shows.

The worst corn we saw was 12 kernels around by 16 kernels long. Any population you figure that at, it’s going to be a disappointing yield. Planting date and moisture before and after planting varies greatly with the results we see today in the field. However, every little thing we did in the past affects it, too.

I have a strip of soybeans below my house where the corn fodder was so thick, I piled up bunches of residue on the drill before I noticed it. It was so bad I had to take a skid loader to try and level it back out the next year. I was probably on the cell phone talking to one of you!

Western Pennsylvania has received more rain than eastern Pennsylvania and it shows. The crop is greener there, but who knows who will harvest the most bushels per acre? The bottom line is net profit, as Marion Calmer teaches in his talks. Which system is going to net me the most net profit?

My picture today is where I planted tillage radish with wheat accidentally. You could see all season long where I dropped the radish with the wheat. I have affected every crop grown in those areas from that day beyond.

For me, the answer is continuous no-till and keeping the fields green all year long. There isn’t much net profit in this unless you own those fields or have them rented for a long period of time.

The Ohio and Pennsylvania crop looks good, but it varies so much and only the farmer knows the true net profit and what caused the end result. Even then, it could be a mystery — like my picture.

A few days ago, I had blogged about the recent run-up in wheat prices on the market due to events in Russia and the Ukraine. Nila Martyniuk of the Agro-Soyuz Corp. in Majske, Ukraine — a good friend to No-Till Farmer and the National No-Tillage Conference — took a moment to update us on the situation on the other side of the globe.

Here are her comments:

“Often, when the press writes about Russia, the Ukraine is thrown into the same pot, so to speak. Ukraine, except for a few regions, has had a relatively successful winter wheat harvest. Russia, according to official announcements, has suffered a 30% decrease in grain harvest yields.

May rains covering significant portions of Ukraine allowed for moisture reserves to protect crops from the intense summer heat. As for the prospects for
winter wheat plantings in the steppes of Ukraine, it’s too early to tell since our rains statistically do come in September and October.”

We’ll try to share a few other insights from Nila at another time.

No-Till Farmer Editor Frank Lessiter and Farm Equipment Editor Mike Lessiter will fly this Wednesday to the Palouse region of southeastern Washington and north central Idaho and spend  6 days observing the wheat harvest in this unique and major agricultural area.

Using Twitter (www.twitter.com/NoTillFarmr) and (www.twitter.com/FEeditors) the two editors will share conversations and photos of their many visits with farmers combining the steep and breathtaking hills in the Palouse, manufacturers and dealers.

You can also find their updates through Twitter by using the hashtag #palouse

I’ve been watching with interest what’s happening with the grain markets since the Ukraine canceled some big export orders of wheat due to some delays in customs clearance and shortages from farmers, all fueled by a ban of wheat exports through the end of the year ordered by Russia. There is even talk that if the drought in the Ukraine continues and limits winter wheat plantings, the export ban could continue well into 2011.

So, at the open, wheat shot up the limit of 60 cents today as more buyers around the world are looking to the United States for its wheat. September wheat ended the day at $7.85 and will have a limit of 90 cents on Friday. We’re at 2-year highs.

Is it time to think about adding winter wheat into your rotation yet this year?

Of course, this also has a positive affect on corn and soybeans. December corn was up 3 cents to finish at $4.18 and November soybeans closed nearly 5 cents higher at $10.29. If the wheat shortage in the Ukraine drags on and U.S. producers start adding more wheat acres to take advantage of the price increase, this certainly could fuel further price increases in corn and soybeans, particularly heading into 2011.

Meanwhile, while this has the makings of good times in the U.S., keep in mind that Ukrainian farmers are likely not enjoying this scenario. We’ll drop a line to our friend Nila Martyniuk of the Agro-Soyuz Corp. in Majske, Ukraine, to see if she can share how our fellow no-tillers are doing there.

Some final thoughts regarding fertilizer on the planter. Last time, we covered in-seed furrow liquid fertilizer applications.

Remember, the seed provides the nutrition for the corn plant through V1. From V1 to V2, plant nutrition is obtained from the seed-furrow area, so having a source of plant-available nutrients is important, especially in the cool soil environment encountered in no-till during the early growing season.

At V3 to V4, the corn plant is determining the potential number of kernels that the ear will develop. This number will never go higher (kernel counts only fall after this stage) than what is determined during early growth, so we do not want to stress the plant by not having enough plant-available nutrients at this stage of growth. The idea is to use plant-available nutrients and/or plant growth regulators to make the plant sense that growing conditions are better than they actually are in cool soils.

There are many fertilizer materials to use as in-furrow nutrient sources. A common starter in our area is based on 10-34-0 at 5 to 7.5 gallons per acre with potassium thiosulfate fertilizer at 1 to 3 quarts per acre and liquid zinc at 1 to 2 quarts per acre. Some growers add a plant-growth regulator type of material, such as Stoller BioForge, at 4 to 16 ounces per acre in the mix.

*Caution* — In high-fertility fields where only nitrogen is needed, our growers are using a stabilized and diluted UAN-solution-based starter in-furrow. Done right, this starter will provide a great starter effect.

*Caution* — You must stabilize the UAN with a product Agrotain or Agrotain Plus to prevent seed and/or seedling injury (ammonia burn) and the UAN must be diluted to a 50:50 UAN:water mix so you can apply enough material for a continuous string (6 gallons per acre). Dilution provides a measure of protection from ammonia injury as well. Do both or do not try it!

You can add liquid zinc if needed and a plant growth regular type of material to provide additional early growth stimulation. If the soil is dry or becomes dry at planting time, add water for a 33:67 UAN/water ratio. Limit nitrogen in-furrow to recommended limits set by your state extension. We do not exceed 10 pounds nitrogen (or nitrogen plus potassium) per acre in-furrow in our area and we reduce this limit in dry soils.

Starter fertilizer that is banded beside or over the row can be liquid or dry granular. The liquid materials listed for in-furrow application work well as long as the 70-pound limit of nitrogen plus potassium is adhered to and the band is at least 2 inches from the row or seed. If using UAN, stabilizing it with a product like Agrotain Plus adds a safety margin and will help protect the supply of nitrogen until the crop needs it.

One of our recommended dry granular starters is a 50:50 blend of SuperU (Agrotain’s stabilized urea) and Sulf-N-45 (Honeywell’s ammonium sulfate) at 100 to 210 pounds of fertilizer per acre when applied 2 to 3 inches from the seed. This is a great high-fertility nitrogen (or nitrogen plus sulfur) starter program with lots of nitrogen stretch into the growing season.

A quick note or two about no-till coulters. First, use a coulter designed for no-till, such as a 13-wave (preferred) or turbo coulter (distant second choice). Bubble coulters are not designed to be used in no-till planting. They are a carry-over from minimum-till days. Because bubble coulters usually cause seed-furrow sidewall compaction, the spike closing wheel came on the scene to correct a problem that in most cases should not have existed.

Type and setting are critically important. Never set the no-till coulter deeper than the double-disc, seed-furrow opener. Standard setting is 1/8 inch shallower than the double-disc opener. *Never set the coulter deeper than the double-disc opener.*

The 13-wave coulter is designed to provide some loosened soil to work with and offer some row cleaning action.

No-till coulter depth control is critical in establishing a stand with high yield potential. It’s very difficult to set and/or maintain the relationship of no-till coulter setting to the double-disc opener setting if the no-till coulter is mounted to the planter frame. Our recommendation is unit-mounted, 13-wave no-till coulters almost without exception. The exception would require a spring-loaded mounting system and depth gauge wheels or other depth-limiting system on a frame-mounted no-till coulter.

Next time, I’ll share my thoughts on row cleaners, planting unit opener discs and depth gauge wheels, and row-closing systems.

Send your questions to Darrell Bruggink at dbruggink@lesspub.com or leave your comments below the blog. You can also view our planter setup video on the Penn State Crop Management Extension Group Web site.

Hi to all from sweltering central Indiana. Last year, we could not buy a 90-degree day, but this year we cannot seem to get out of this heat. Fortunately, we have had consistent thunderstorms that have brought rain to our area. It would be nice, though, for the corn to have a breather at night to extend the growing season.

Here are my observations since I submitted my last blog. After getting slammed with some flooding rains early on, the corn crop looks pretty decent. The rows around are not as much I would like (a lot of 14 around), but if we can get some cooling off and with these rains we have been having, hopefully we can have some good ear fill and high test weights.

Since pollination early in July, I have been seeing quite of bit of gray leaf spot, of which we have sprayed 25% with some Headline AMP. What I have really noticed is a lot of nitrogen deficiency, especially with the racehorse hybrids. The fixed ear or workhorse hybrids have seemed like they are filling quickly.

The observation that really stands out is that where I had annual ryegrass applied last fall, the racehorse hybrids are green from head to toe. The cover crop experts have said that annual ryegrass is a nitrogen scavenger that releases the available nitrate late in the growing season. With keeping a close eye on how the corn crop looks in these fields, I’m becoming a big believer in it.

I purchased a spad meter this year that analyzes the chlorophyll content of the corn stalk. With the results I have been recording with and without the annual ryegrass, I am seeing some dramatic results with the available nitrate that is left. It will be interesting to see how this plays out with the yield monitor this fall.

On the soybeans fields, I have been amazed of how my residual application of just 3 ounces of Valor XLT and 1 pint of 2,4-D 1 week to 10 days before planting have held so well. As a matter of fact, I did not spray a post application of glyphosate on at least a third of my fields. These are on the fields that have had annual ryegrass this past fall or in the past. Sure, I have had some late escapes here and there of mostly giant ragweed and foxtail, but nothing that I should spray late to make the field look completely clean.

I put some strip tests out with and without the glyphosate applications and applied a post grass only in comparison with the glyphosate to see how much if any yield reduction I will have this fall. I also did several strip tests of foliar recipes that some of you had provided me feedback and I’m anxious to see if these will show up with the combine.

Speaking of combines, we better get it ready soon. Looks like my 2.6’s will be ready by the last week of August. Last year, none of our beans were ready until the third week of September. Again, what a difference a year makes. Just one of the many challenges no-tillers have to contend with.