Battle for the Belt: Season 4, Episode 2 – Introduction to Battle for the Belt 2.0

Season 4, Episode 2 of Battle for the Belt is now available: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhfbTIGqDpA

This 2026 growing season, we are ready to bring you the second round of Battle for the Belt 2.0 - corn and soybean replanting decisions. Planting dates continue to be an important factor because of weather dynamics, like the trend for earlier last freeze dates in the spring. Farmers are trending toward earlier planting dates in their fields to maximize yield while balancing out the limited number of fieldwork days during the planting season. Earlier planting can be affected by abiotic factors such as saturated soils, surface crusting, and cold damage, as well as biotic factors like seedcorn maggot, slugs, and diseases, all of which can reduce the target plant population (Figure 1).

When low plant populations exist, a common question is whether to replant fields or not. To address that question, in 2025 and 2026, we are working on a project on replant decisions for corn and soybean. The project is funded by USDA NIFA AFRI under the Critical Agriculture Research and Extension (CARE) program.

Like Battle for the Belt 1.0, the replanting trial is being conducted at the Western Research Station (Clark County), the Northwest Research Station (Wood County), and in Northeast Ohio (Wooster Campus, Wayne County). The project involves five seeding rates and five planting dates for each crop (Table 1).

Table 1. Distribution of treatments through the different planting dates and seeding rates for the replanting trial, 2025 and 2026 crop seasons. Typical corn and soybean seeding rates are shown in bold. The list includes low seeding rates to purposely achieve low plant populations.

Often, crops planted earlier with a resulting lower plant population can yield comparably or better than a higher stand established later in the year. For instance, looking at results in the literature, corn planted at the end of April with a population of 25,000 plants per acre can achieve yields close to 98% of the optimum yield. The same dataset shows that planting in mid-to-late May, even achieving a higher plant density (35,000 plants per acre), would result in a 10-20% yield loss (relative to the optimum yield). These references are helpful; however, they are not updated for current trends nor representative for Ohio conditions, including new hybrids and changing environmental conditions. The objectives of Battle of the Belt 2.0 are:

1. Identify soybean and corn replant thresholds based on plant populations and planting dates.

2. Develop a decision support tool to compare replant scenarios.

3. Implement extension programming with frequent updates during the crop season.

Progress Update – 2026
We established our first planting date for both corn and soybeans in Clark County last Friday, April 10, at the Western Agricultural Research Station (Table 2; Figure 2). Stay tuned for continuous updates from this exciting project through this C.O.R.N. Newsletter and YouTube channel:
Ohio State Agronomy YouTube channel

Table 2. Planting date soil and temperature conditions for the first day of corn and soybean planting at the Western Agricultural Research Station in Clark County, 2026. The soil and air temperature data was retrieved from: https://weather.cfaes.osu.edu/