Minnesota Crop News

University of Minnesota Extension’s popular Nitrogen Smart program is available as an interactive online course, featuring short videos and quick quizzes to test your knowledge. Now, you can take two advanced courses: one on manure management and the other a deep dive into the 4Rs. The objective of Nitrogen Smart is to help growers understand how nitrogen behaves in the environment for the purpose of customizing management to fit your soil and weather conditions. The most efficient nitrogen management is also the most profitable, and participants will learn how to adjust rates and application practices to achieve optimal efficiency. The online courses are self-paced. You may register at any point and complete the coursework when it is convenient for you. Thanks to the generous support of the Minnesota Corn Growers, these courses are available to participants at no charge. Manure management Livestock manures have been used as a crop fertilizer source for thousands of years and continues...

Angie Peltier, UMN Extension educator, Ed Usset, UMN Extension grain marketing specialist and Ken Hellevang, NDSU Extension agricultural engineer Photo: Angie Peltier The following information was provided during a 2023 Strategic Farming: Field Notes session. Use your preferred podcasting platform or listen online to a podcast of this Field Notes session. Preparing grain bins before harvest Making sure that your grain bin is ready to accept grain is a positive step toward protecting your 2023 season-long investment. Best practices for making sure that your grain bins are ready include: Inspect your grain bin from the inside out on a sunny day, looking for sunlight shining through revealing any holes to be patched. The region of the bin that is most at risk of failing is where the steel meets the concrete. Make sure that the bin is clean of all remaining material left from your 2022 crops. As a general rule, if you can tell what 2022 crop had been in the bin, it needs to be cleaned. I...

The intermittent rains, heavy dews, and cooler nighttime temperatures may have you wondering about the risk of sprout damage and low Hagberg Falling Numbers. We have not reached that point just yet but below are two articles I put together in 2019 and 2020 that detail the mechanisms that trigger low HFN and ways to manage the harvest and storage of wheat with low HFN. The 2019 post, titled 'Help, My Numbers are Falling', can be found here . The 2020 post, titled 'Are My Numbers Falling....Again?', can be found here . Good luck with the remainder of the harvest. 

  Anthony Hanson, Field Crops Extension Educator - Integrated Pest Management Each year in September and October, U of M research and extension scientists conduct a state-wide survey to determine the percentage of plants infested with European corn borer (ECB) in growers' fields. This survey is also used to assess disease prevalence, such as tar spot. This year, we plan to sample approximately 125 fields primarily across the state. A handful of fields are randomly selected in each county to represent the primarily predominant Bt acres where ECB populations are usually low due to the protection conferred by Bt traits specific to ECB. However, because ECB populations are inherently low in fields with protection,  non-Bt  fields are also needed in the survey  to get a more accurate snapshot of populations and potential risk. Scouts visually inspect stalks for feeding damage and larval presence, so no effort or specialized plots on the grower's part is needed for a field...

Join us Wednesday, August 23th, for guidance of grain storage preparation with Dr. Kenneth Hellevang, Professor and Extension Engineer at North Dakota State University and for grain marketing updates with Ed Usset, U of MN  Grain Marketing Economist  on  Strategic Farming: Field Notes. The webinar runs from 8:00 – 8:30 a.m. This will be the last webinar of the year, but be sure to join us for Strategic Farming: Let's Talk Crops later this winter and when Field Notes resumes in the spring. Learn more and register Can’t make the live session? No problem. The discussion-based series will be posted immediately following the webinar to your favorite podcast-streaming service to listen at your convenience. Thanks to the Minnesota Soybean Research and Promotion Council and the Minnesota Corn Research and Promotion Council for their generous support of this program. 

Phyllis Bongard, Educational content development and communications specialist, Jeff Coulter and Seth Naeve, Extension agronomists A wet spring followed by dry conditions has resulted in a challenging growing season. Drs. Jeff Coulter and Seth Naeve, Extension agronomists, gave crop updates during the August 16 Field Notes session. They were joined by moderator Anthony Hanson, Extension crops educator. Corn update In general, Coulter feels the crop is looking better. However, conditions continue to vary widely around the state. Some areas have received timely rains, while others continue to be excessively dry.  Conditions were warm and dry during pollination, resulting in some kernel abortion near the ear tips. While corn can continue to lose kernels through the end of the milk stage under stressful conditions, most of the crop is now at the late milk to early dough stage and kernel numbers are set. As the crop transitions into grain filling, sufficient moisture will result in big...

Anthony Hanson - UMN Extension Educator (hans4022@umn.edu) - Integrated Pest Management, Ian MacRae - UMN Extension Entomologist, Bruce Potter - UMN Extension IPM Specialist, Robert Koch - UMN Extension Soybean Entomologist, and Fei Yang - UMN Extension Corn Entomologist Differential grasshopper. Photo: Bruce Potter High grasshopper populations have been observed in several areas of Minnesota in 2023. If grasshoppers are a concern in your fields, a recently updated extension guide on grasshoppers in field crops will give in-depth guidance on grasshopper species, how to scout, and what thresholds and insecticides should be used for each crop. Grasshoppers generally prefer areas with undisturbed soil to lay eggs such as in pastures, hay ground, field edges, road ditches, and sometimes cropland. The immatures (i.e., wingless nymphs) and adults feed on live grasses and forbs. The depletion of their food source from grasshopper feeding, roadside and hay land mowing, and small grain harvest...

Seth Naeve and Jeff Coulter, Extension Agronomists Hail damage in soybean, 2020. Photo: Dave Nicolai We have heard it over and over this year. “It’s so dry, we are desperate for rain, but we don’t need any hail with it,” or something this effect. Statewide, Minnesota has been plagued by lack of rain from June through July. Just as the weather patterns seemed to change for the better, some heavy thunderstorms boiled up in south central Minnesota on Friday afternoon and evening. These storms affected parts of Renville, McLeod, Meeker, Wright and Carver counties and beyond. Hail was very intense in some areas where either large quantities or very large hail stones fell. There have been many reports of damaged property and crops. August hailstorms are not uncommon, but they can be particularly disheartening for farmers. Hail in mid-August can be the most devastating for crop yields and they also occur after much energy has been spent making the crop. This year may be especially fru...

This week, Megan McCaghey joins hosts David Nicolai and Seth Naeve on Minnesota CropCast. Dr. McCaghey focuses her work on soilborne fungi affecting important Minnesota crops. She spends much of her time working on Phytophthora and Sclerotinia Stem Rot. Her position is not tied to individual crops or diseases allowing her to use her expertise to help more producers with more disease challenges. Dr. McCaghey also works with interdisciplinary teams to help solve some of the toughest challenges in crop diseases. She is especially interested in utilizing altered soybean canopy structure to reduce the incidence of white mold in soybean. Join David, Seth, and Megan for a fun(gi) discussion about crop diseases on this week’s Minnesota CropCast. Listen to the podcast What is Minnesota CropCast? Hosts David Nicolai and Seth Naeve discuss the progress and challenges of Minnesota's agronomic crops in this new podcast. They are joined by a diversity of specialists representing all crops...

Angie Peltier, UMN Extension educator, Tom Peters, UMN Extension sugarbeet agronomist and Bob Koch, UMN Extension soybean entomologist Waterhemp. Photo: Angie Peltier The following information was provided during a 2023 Strategic Farming: Field Notes session. Read further to learn more about this free program that takes place each Wednesday morning throughout the growing season. Weed management: a challenge in dry conditions This growing season began with an abnormally hot mid-May and June, which likely had an effect on weed seed germination, emergence, and management.. We have weed species in Minnesota that are challenging to manage every year, that are all the more challenging to manage in hot and dry conditions. Kochia emerges first Kochia is one of the first weeds to germinate and emerge in spring. We control kochia either with preemergence herbicides or postemergence herbicides over very small kochia. Kochia emerged so quickly or before the PREs could be activated by rainfall and...

The plot combines have, just like their big brothers, been rolling across Minnesota these past few weeks.  This rainy day allowed me to crunch some of the data and share the preliminary results of the trials with you.  Go to the University of Minnesota Variety Trial Results page here , pick your favorite small grain, and scroll down to the Google Sheet that is embedded in the webpage.  These Google Sheets will get updated as more data comes in.   Combine harvest of a spring wheat variety trial near Benson, MN with a Zurn 150 plot combine  Some impressions from the trials as well as reports from producers I have talked to so far suggest that grain yields are better than hoped for with really good test weights, grain quality, and few if any, scabby kernels. . 

In this episode of the Nutrient Management Podcast, we’re talking about the fall fertilizer outlook for 2023. What are growing conditions looking like around the state? What is the current status of fertilizer prices and availability in Minnesota? What should growers be thinking about heading into fall? There is a lot of talk about environmental issues related to fertilizer use and the potential for future regulation. How should that play into application decisions for this fall? Transcript Guests: Daniel Kaiser, Extension nutrient management specialist (St. Paul) Jeff Strock, Extension soil scientist (Lamberton) Brad Carlson, Extension educator (Mankato) Additional resources: Nitrogen Smart Online Course 2023 Fertilizer Guidelines for Agronomic Crops in Minnesota publication now available Making sense of Minnesota’s corn fertilizer guidelines: Frequently asked questions and answers IDC in soybean: 4 things to know about managing iron deficiency chlorosis Before applying manure, chec...

Join us Wednesday, August 9th, for the latest update on soybean aphids and spider mites with Dr. Bob Koch, Extension soybean entomologist on Strategic Farming: Field Notes. We'll also welcome Dr. Tom Peters, Extension sugarbeet agronomist and weed specialist, who will review weed management concerns and lessons learned to date in 2023.     The webinar runs from 8:00 – 8:30 a.m and the program continues weekly through August.  Learn more and register Can’t make the live session? No problem. The discussion-based series will be posted immediately following the webinar to your favorite podcast-streaming service to listen at your convenience. Thanks to the Minnesota Soybean Research and Promotion Council and the Minnesota Corn Research and Promotion Council for their generous support of this program. 

Anthony Hanson & Angie Peltier, UMN Extension Regional Educators During the 2023 growing season, U of MN Extension IPM workers  have been scouting wheat and soybean fields for pests in northwest and west-central Minnesota. As we move into August, scouts are wrapping up wheat sampling for wheat head diseases, and will continue to scout through mid-August for soybean insects, especially soybean aphid. This Western IPM Pest Survey continued this year with support by the Minnesota Soybean Research and Promotion Council (MSRPC) and Minnesota Wheat Research and Promotion Council. Weekly maps are produced jointly with NDSU to show growth staging and pest pressure and to help alert growers when they should be scouting their fields for pests. Usually, three scouts are hired based out of Crookston, Moorhead, and Morris to cover the majority of the western half of the state.  Unfortunately, we could not find someone to fill the Morris position this year, so while the maps in this art...

Dr. Robert Koch is best known for leading the U of MN’s soybean entomology program. Bob has been forced to react to changes in Minnesota’s insect, weather and economic challenges confronting Minnesota soybean growers. In this episode he talks with Dave Nicolai about his applied research and extension activities as well as his personal and academic background. Bob provided an update of his work concerning the management of soybean aphid such as control strategies when dealing with insecticide resistance. Bob and his lab personnel have conducted in-depth lab and field analysis of different insecticide resistance issues facing soybean growers in many areas of Minnesota. Bob has also provided leadership and close coordination with other Minnesota Integrated Pest Management specialists in the study and control options for new and invasive insects which can affect Minnesota soybeans such as the Gall Midge and other defoliator insects. Finally, Dr. Koch provided an update about the current ...