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By Stephen K. Barnhart, Department of Agronomy
Hay is an agricultural product that varies greatly in nutritional quality. The ‘hay market’ frequently uses descriptive terms like ‘dairy quality,, ‘beef-cow quality’ or more quantitative terms like ‘premium,’ ‘good’, and ‘fair’; which have some forage testing guidelines to place hay lots in these categories.
By Marlin Rice and Rich Pope, Department of Entomology
Stalk borers are notorious for killing or stunting corn rows next to fences, grassed waterways and conservation terraces. To stop this damage, fields must be scouted and an insecticide applied on a timely basis before the larvae have an opportunity to tunnel into the growing point of the young plants.
And then it rained, and rained some more. Heavy and severe thunderstorms were generated by a lingering front that parked over Iowa for the bulk of the week. Consequently, little field work was accomplished in most fields in Iowa.
By Roger Elmore and Lori Abendroth, Department of Agronomy
Storms on June 4 and 5 not only brought more ‘unwelcomed’ rain but also damaging winds and destructive hail. Variation currently exists in corn development across Iowa, ranging from emerged to the sixth leaf stage. Vegetative stages are determined and most often referred to based on the leaf-collar method developed by Iowa State agronomists.
By Mahdi Al Kaisi, Department of Agronomy, and Matt Helmers, Department of Ag and BioSystems Engineering
As we write this article spring rains are coming hard and fast causing substantial soil erosion when soils are most vulnerable because of degraded crop residue cover, soil preparation by tillage and no crop canopy.
By XB Yang, Department of Plant Pathology
Iowa weather during the last week of May behaved like, well, Iowa spring weather.
For the week, temperatures statewide were close to or slightly below long-term averages, and soil temperatures were general for rapid growth and development of both corn and soybean.
In addition, sporadic rains from “dust settlers” to “goose drowners” led to lots of variability in crop progress, with only a day or two suitable for field work; some areas of northwest and west central Iowa being the exceptions where more work time was available.
By Palle Pedersen, Department of Agronomy
Whether we like it,or not, there are many areas in Iowa where farmers are still waiting to plant soybeans and now, given the recent weather, many fields are going to need to be replanted. Based on the May 25 estimates from USDA, only 72 percent of our soybean acres were planted compared 80 percent last year. Bottom line: we can continue to plant soybeans until early July but a few management practices may need to be changed.
By Mike Owen, Department of Agronomy
Given the recent bad weather, it is likely that a number of corn fields will be considered for replanting to soybean. However, before this is considered, two things must be resolved; first, how will you remove the existing corn stand and second, was there a residual herbicide treatment applied to the corn?
By Palle Pedersen, Department of Agronomy
After talking to many agronomists and farmers around the state today (May 30) it seems that many will have to replant a few fields because of the extensive rainfall that we have received over the last week. Looking at the weather forecast for Iowa today, it just does not seem to give us any relief with chances of rain pretty much every day during the next week.
