It seemed to take forever this spring, but hopefully all of your soybeans are planted – for the first and only time. Ohio’s biggest challenge is replanting; it is costly (new seed, cost of planting, lower yields due to delay in planting). The first step is assessing overall stand health – do you have enough plants to obtain the best yields? Based on a substantial amount of data, for soybeans planted in May, a harvest population of at least 100,000 plants/acre is generally adequate to maximize yield.
With lower prices and higher input costs in todays soybean farming operations, some farmers are looking where to shave a few dollars off their costs of farming. Based on the calls directly from farmers on which seed treatments to use – it is not too hard to figure out where some of those savings might be coming from. This used to be general practice but there are ways to do this to be sure it really is saving farmer’s money.
Improving soybean yields in 2018 begins first with the selection of the cultivars that have the best resistance package for Ohio’s notorious pathogens and pests. Any grower that’s slacked off on the Phytophthora package gets a quick reminder of the damage that this pathogen can continually cause in a vast majority of Ohio’s production regions. Same thing with soybean cyst nematode; while the symptoms may not be present, planting a susceptible variety and getting half the yield that the neighbors got leaves some farmers scratching their heads.
I don’t think too many people in the state will deny that Ohio’s planting conditions were tough. We had a mix of saturated soils and cool temperatures. We have several soil borne pathogens that love these conditions, among them is Sudden death syndrome, which is caused by Fusarium virguliforme. In Ohio, this disease tends to occur with greater frequency in fields that have higher populations of soybean cyst nematode.
Managing Soybean Rust, Bulletin SR2008. Publication covers specifics of soybean rust identification and management. General section of the publication cover the use of fungicide sin general for disease control including description of products and their activity, application information and modes of action.
Septoria brown Spot: This fungus survives on old soybean residue and is splashed onto lower leaves.