Spring has arrived and this year we don’t have to wonder when the snowbanks will start getting smaller. Instead, much of the upper Midwest has been having unseasonably warm weather for three to four weeks and have been able to ditch the warm jackets and start working on outdoor tasks. In looking at the weather forecast there is a high probability of rain the first two days of this week while there is a front containing rain and snow marching across several states in the SW mountain and plains states. They need the moisture and would welcome any showers.
Realistically the longer days with temps in the 60s will serve to increase soil temperatures in the top 4” four inches. We saw fieldwork being done with field cultivators being pulled and anhydrous being applied down near KC, so all signs point to needing to be ready to commence the 2021 growing season sometime in the next 2 to 3 weeks at our latitudes. It is always refreshing to smell the scents of newly emerged grass and plants, the earthy smell of fields being worked knowing that we will be planting again, dropping seeds in the ground and hoping that it will be a summer with lots of sunshine, adequate rainfall, gentle breezes and moderate temperatures. How will that proceed and when will the first challenges develop.
This Past Weekend
I had mentioned in a few past columns that our grandson Jack Robert was diagnosed with a serious auto-immune disease, HLH. We were first told it was due to an environmental or genetic cause. Since then they have only tested for genetic causes. His site of treatment moved from St Louis to Cincinnati, so different living arrangements had to be made. Last week after rounds of chemo, bone marrow transplant, kidney dialysis, intubation, oxygen and it seemed every treatment under the sun, the toll on his 8-month body became too much and he quit breathing. His mother had gotten her MS in Psychology/Social work at the Univ of Michigan and worked in that field for the St L school system. She started a blog relating Jack’s story of getting treated, to lend a voice for other kids with the same diagnosis. Her blog was read and watched across the country and even overseas. His death left us wondering what the purpose of his short life on earth was and what he was meant to be or do. At this point it seems to bring attention to the children who are suffering from similar health problems. It rained during his wake, but the sun shone during his funeral. So long Jack. We will see you again in 30 or so years.
Any Meetings?
It seems there are two groups of people in the state and country. Those whose lives have been changed and can stay isolated and feel okay wearing these masks, versus those who still have work to get done and will make sure that happens whether there is some perceived risk or not. Anyone who has been around hogs or chicken recognizes that having viruses around is just normal. We just try to minimize the effect and hope we can maintain a healthy and nutritious diet to keep the animals and humans as disease resistant as possible.
That so called lockdown caused problems in the Ag community as we saw events like the Farm Progress Show, the 2020 Swine Expo, and other Ag Shows get canceled. Zoom meetings just didn’t seem to deliver the info as effectively as in person where hallway conversations and banter is often as valuable as the presentations.
With our Central Iowa Ag and Supply we have partnered with a supply company to hold smaller meetings at different locations across the state. Doing the planning was made more difficult with the travel we were obliged to do, but I will be seeing some of you are those smaller gatherings.
As the grain prices have risen we have seen both land and fertilizer prices increase. Any products that boost fertilizer efficiency be it nitrogen, phosphorous or micros will be hot items this spring. One thing that has helped is that there are now more newly designed planter attachments that allow the operator to place nutrients or biologicals in or along the seed slice to make it available earlier in the season. Typically, the greater the biological availability, the greater the bushel return from such input products. One of the most important will be the N stabilizers that can be mixed in the UAN products. Those vary as to how they make the N last longer in the desired form. Some stabilizers use Calcium, some sulfur, some use a carbon source, which can be sugar or a form of humate. Molasses fits into this category. Nutri-sphere works by chelating the Ni from the urease molecule so the conversion to NO3 is slowed or delayed. Given a choice I prefer the stabilizers that last many months, are not corrosive or caustic and are safe to soil biology. Those are tougher to find. The new one that we are watching this year is the new CetaiN from CarbonWorks. It did well in Minnesota fields the last two seasons.
I have been waiting for a stabilizer from BASF to enter the market since 2018 and still have not heard or its fate in recent years. It performed great in trials at Purdue back in the early 1980s but has not crossed the pond yet.
Management Improvements
One large area in which I hear more questions about is how to manage a good tissue testing program and how to respond to respond to that data that is returned to them. A tissue testing program is basically a report card for how well the pre-plant fertility program interacted with soil biology or any biological inoculant to get into the plants to meet their nutritional requirements. At the least one set of exact or representative samples should be pulled and analyzed by a lab which can give recommendations. Phosphorous is likely the one mineral that should be pulled early since ensuring that the critical levels of .42 is reached will influence kernel row number. The other minerals are not as growth stage critical but are still important. Those include Mn, Mg, Zn, Cu, S, Bo and Moly.
The next question is then for efficiency’s sake should those minerals be soil or foliar applied? The answer there is it depends on items like: what trips will be made yet across the field where a broadcast application can be made; how much of each mineral needs to be applied; what is the cost difference between foliar or broadcast applied; are the soil pHs above 7.3 range where tie-up can be a problem; is the Haney score in the 13+ range where biological release is good or it so low that only an efficient foliar will give it access into the plant. This is where the foliar information generated by HB Tukey at Michigan State can allow you to make accurate comparisons between soil or foliar applications.
Sodic and Salt Intrusion Soils
In meeting with George Sims, the founder of CarbonWorks, and Salam Awada, PhD soil chemist from Logan, Utah, and last week with two farmers from northern S Dakota last week I had to adjust my thinking to soils that may have a 6.0 to 6.7 pH in the top six inches but below that the pH may jump to 8.3 to 8.6. This alters nutrient availability and root growth dramatically, so products and practices need to be different than in states with our grassland derived soils. Such soils typically tie up applied P very quickly and have much lower levels of biological life and are bacterial dominant. Fungi grow best in acidic soils (pH of 2 to 7) while bacteria prefer -2 or +2 pH ranges from a neutral 7.0. Growers may easily see over 95% of applied P be unavailable to the crop that season as it ties up with excess Ca. The products and practices that seem to solve the problems involve sugars or sugar/biological mixes, those that deliver oxygen to deeper into the soils and carry a low pH or high negative EC. So far those successful products have been Bio Release or RSTC17.
Bob Streit is an independent crop consultant and columnist for Farm News. He can be reached at (515) 709-0143 or www.CentralIowaAg.com.