Tag Archives: seed

Soybean Harvest 2019

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  • A beautiful day to harvest!
  • A view from the cab.

2019 presented us with challenges in timeliness and quality for soybean and corn harvesting. Harvest was much later than usual, which meant that we didn’t have the normal, dry weather we need for soybeans to come out of the field at less than 13% moisture. This is a problem in a couple of ways. First the elevators will discount the soybeans brought in over 13% by 1% for every 1/2% they are over 13%. As the moisture climbs higher, the discount percent increases more yet. The second challenge is presented because we raise seed beans for Pioneer. They don’t want our soybeans for seed if they are over 14%. We waited through two days of sun and slight warmth to get to that point and still ended up with a bin of seed that tested higher than 14%.

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Poor Corn Emergence

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It is frustrating to find that major seed companies don’t have a level of quality control that matches their seed prices. With the impending wet and cold planting season that was forecast this spring, we had our equipment ready to get a jump start planting corn if that window of opportunity presented itself. April 18 – April 24 was our window and it quickly closed again until May 5. Two of the five varieties we planted failed at their first task of creating a good stand (high percentage) that emerges evenly. Gold Country 104-37 had very uneven emergence and a thin stand. Dekalb 52-85 had even emergence but, once again, a thin stand. Why don’t these companies publish a cold germ test on their seed tags? Warm germ is quite deceiving.

In this photos, taken from the top of our grain leg, you can see the difference in stand. The one on the left is obviously thinner than the one on the right. Both are Dekalb varieties.

2014 multi-site field study of Clariva

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The University of MN has done farmers a big favor by doing a rigorous study on soybean seed treatments: A 2014 multi-site field study on the effects of Clariva seed treatment on soybean yield and Soybean Cyst Nematode reproduction. “Significant yield responses to either seed treatment, above the untreated controls, were not common in 2014.” according to the study. Another item to take note of “Seed treatments did not change SCN reproduction compared to untreated seed. ”

In the study above, there is also a link to the detailed report.

Doing a quick search for Clariva seed treatment I came up with this page from Syngenta touting the great benefits for Clariva to farmers.

Every farmers is constantly being up sold by the seed companies with seed treatments for soybeans. It is a huge market and extremely profitable to the companies selling the products. There seems to be little documented evidence of the benefits to farmers when looking at unbiased university studies.