Can someone splain me something?
- Thread starter Whitewing
- Start date
Faster horses
Well-known member
Sometimes.... 
mwj
Well-known member
They are checking the yield. They do a kernel count by counting the rows on the ears. Then they take an average and multiply by the plants per acre.
Brad S
Well-known member
Strip tillage is a minimum tillage variant. On your planter you have like 12" sweeps that till the seed row ahead of the opener. You throw out of the row when you plant (creating ridges) then throw in the row later if you have weed problems. I think the roundup ready corn mostly obsoleted ridge running.
Brad S
Well-known member
Sometimes you see husks pulled back to reveal the ears at field days, like dakalb. On that picture, you notice the corn filled to the end of the ear without ear worm damage. That might be the point. I'm guessing that is gmo corn.
Haytrucker
Well-known member
- Joined
- Feb 11, 2005
- Messages
- 776
Not to argue, but in our country, strip tillage is done with a specific machine. It tills a 4 inch swath every 30 inches. Can rip to 24 inches deep, and places liquid fertilizer in one or two zones below the row to be planted. A little residue clearance, and a set of packing wheels behind. It's the latest thing around here, for the past dozen years or so.
Thanks guys for the responses. And as long as you're teaching me some stuff, please help me out with another question.
I'm planting grain sorghum each year now because it does much better with the limited rainfall we've been receiving. It's also less costly for me to plant and maintain as I can plant, fertilize, spray, etc with equipment I already have on hand.
Corn is more tricky here because of the rainfall issue and I don't have a seeder. And when I'd want to plant, every seeder in the state is occupied on much larger tracts of land so I'd have to wait.
I planted about 80 acres of grain sorghum this year. The first planting (broadcast seed) of about half my plowed ground got a heavy rainfall the day we planted, so heavy that I opted not to try to cover the seed. This planting germinated nicely and is now ready for harvest.
My second planting also got a rainfall the day we planted, but much less rain than before. Because we were baling elsewhere, I opted to not cover the seed again. This planting failed which was my fault.
After a couple of weeks, I replowed and replanted......but covered the seed this time and got a decent stand of sorghum though rainfall has been sparse since.
We've had enough rainfall that the plants are progressing in a satisfactory manner, but it's been difficult to time fertilizing and adding urea. We did get a heavy rainfall last Friday night (the first in a month) and I spread urea on Saturday morning without problem. I'm now concerned though that we may not get enough rainfall going forward to add the fertilizer I'd like to put down.
So here's my question.
In order to not have this worry about adding fertilizer at the right time with next year's planting, is there anything to keep me from incorporating the fertilizer with my last pass of the plow before planting? Urea I'll add with a rainfall and wet ground as the plants reach the right growth stage.
For some reason, folks here don't like the idea of incorporating fertilizer with the plowing.
Again, your input is appreciated.
I'm planting grain sorghum each year now because it does much better with the limited rainfall we've been receiving. It's also less costly for me to plant and maintain as I can plant, fertilize, spray, etc with equipment I already have on hand.
Corn is more tricky here because of the rainfall issue and I don't have a seeder. And when I'd want to plant, every seeder in the state is occupied on much larger tracts of land so I'd have to wait.
I planted about 80 acres of grain sorghum this year. The first planting (broadcast seed) of about half my plowed ground got a heavy rainfall the day we planted, so heavy that I opted not to try to cover the seed. This planting germinated nicely and is now ready for harvest.
My second planting also got a rainfall the day we planted, but much less rain than before. Because we were baling elsewhere, I opted to not cover the seed again. This planting failed which was my fault.
After a couple of weeks, I replowed and replanted......but covered the seed this time and got a decent stand of sorghum though rainfall has been sparse since.
We've had enough rainfall that the plants are progressing in a satisfactory manner, but it's been difficult to time fertilizing and adding urea. We did get a heavy rainfall last Friday night (the first in a month) and I spread urea on Saturday morning without problem. I'm now concerned though that we may not get enough rainfall going forward to add the fertilizer I'd like to put down.
So here's my question.
In order to not have this worry about adding fertilizer at the right time with next year's planting, is there anything to keep me from incorporating the fertilizer with my last pass of the plow before planting? Urea I'll add with a rainfall and wet ground as the plants reach the right growth stage.
For some reason, folks here don't like the idea of incorporating fertilizer with the plowing.
Again, your input is appreciated.
Brad S
Well-known member
I grew up planting milo aka grain sorghum in western Kansas, and completely understand your issues of input costs. I compliment your analysis. I used to think dry land corn was sorta like shooting a 360 layup to show off when you got just as many points for a simple bankshot. Well now these modern corn varieties can perform on very little water, so my opinion has changed. That said, the equipment we take for granted, you just don't have. If you can get your hands on a flute feed disc drill, you can do a lot.
To answer your question, by all means, your phosphorous can be applied prior to plowing. What do you consider plowing? We usually consider plowing is moldboard plowing, but there is chisel plowing and disc plowing, and a lighter disc operation is disc harrowing. I'd mostly suggest chisel plowing with the old style drag harrows after the phosphorus has been applied. Deep phosphorous is ideal (phosphorous is stable) It's pretty well established that liquid phosphorous shouldn't contact the seeds (we used to put it right in the furrow with the seeds)
If you're farming on minimal moisture, ground tillage simply costs moisture you can't spare. I've never broadcast seeded milo, but I gather you broadcast because you're fresh out of a drill or planter. One of the best solutions to so many problems is to rotate crops. Is there something you can grow that will set you up for milo?
To answer your question, by all means, your phosphorous can be applied prior to plowing. What do you consider plowing? We usually consider plowing is moldboard plowing, but there is chisel plowing and disc plowing, and a lighter disc operation is disc harrowing. I'd mostly suggest chisel plowing with the old style drag harrows after the phosphorus has been applied. Deep phosphorous is ideal (phosphorous is stable) It's pretty well established that liquid phosphorous shouldn't contact the seeds (we used to put it right in the furrow with the seeds)
If you're farming on minimal moisture, ground tillage simply costs moisture you can't spare. I've never broadcast seeded milo, but I gather you broadcast because you're fresh out of a drill or planter. One of the best solutions to so many problems is to rotate crops. Is there something you can grow that will set you up for milo?
Triangle Bar
Well-known member
WW, that depends on a few things. What is the makeup of your soil? Soil that is more sand has less water holding capacity and as the water percolates through the soil your nitrogen will move with it and move beyond the root zone of the plants. This is called leaching. Likewise soil with more clay or something in between like a sandy loam will have a greater water capacity and will not percolate as fast or as far thus reduce leaching. This is why farmers will use a starter fertilizer at planting or only apply a third or half of their nutrients at planting.
What kind of 'plow' are you using? Incorporating with a plow is fine depending on the working depth of the plow and what kind of nutrients you are incorporating. Phosphorous tends to move more laterally instead of vertically in soil and incorporated into the soil at the depth of the root zone for your crop is a great technique.
It boils down to getting the nutrients in the right place at the right time for the crop to utilize them.
A link on N leaching and soil structure.
http://www.ipni.net/publication/nitrogen-en.nsf/book/FDEE48CFF7600CE585257C13004C7BB0/$FILE/NitrogenNotes-EN-03.pdf
What kind of 'plow' are you using? Incorporating with a plow is fine depending on the working depth of the plow and what kind of nutrients you are incorporating. Phosphorous tends to move more laterally instead of vertically in soil and incorporated into the soil at the depth of the root zone for your crop is a great technique.
It boils down to getting the nutrients in the right place at the right time for the crop to utilize them.
A link on N leaching and soil structure.
http://www.ipni.net/publication/nitrogen-en.nsf/book/FDEE48CFF7600CE585257C13004C7BB0/$FILE/NitrogenNotes-EN-03.pdf
Brad S
Well-known member
"We've had enough rainfall that the plants are progressing in a satisfactory manner, but it's been difficult to time fertilizing and adding urea. We did get a heavy rainfall last Friday night (the first in a month) and I spread urea on Saturday morning without problem. I'm now concerned though that we may not get enough rainfall going forward to add the fertilizer I'd like to put down"
As I understand the post, the urea (nitrogen) is going on post emergence. Probably a good time for most of the nitrogen if you can budget the extra trip.
As I understand the post, the urea (nitrogen) is going on post emergence. Probably a good time for most of the nitrogen if you can budget the extra trip.
Phosphate doesn't move much in the soil. When I was selling fertilizer, we liked to see a preplant of fertilizer incorporated with in the top 2 inches of the ground. We sold liquid fertilizer, and had setups for about every sort of implement a person can imagine. I would not want to see any fertilizer mixed in any deeper then 2 inches. Doesn't do the plant a whole lot of good.
LazyWP said:
We broadcast dry fertilizer pre-plant then run across it with a multi weeder then plant works well for us. The multi-weeder does'nt bury it to deep and smooths the field out at the same time which makes for a nicer ride for the extended chopper chute on our chopper.
Great input guys, thanks! Here's some detail of how/what I'm doing.
A little about our weather here first. We have two seasons, a dry one (summer) and a wet one (winter). Winter normally starts in May and runs through the end of the year.....though the months of June, July, and August normally give us the best rainfalls. Sept, Oct, in some years produces some decent water....Nov and December normally much less.
Summer is brutal. We sometimes go several months without a drop of rain......March/April being the worst.
My soils are mostly sandy loam and my land fairly hilly......drains/drys pretty fast. Having said that, Í've got soils in some of the 'lower' areas that are almost black and are very productive though trickier to work during the rainy season.
I'm working the ground with my Brazilian-made JD, 95 hp tractor and a 20 disc plow. When humid enough, the ground breaks up nicely and normally within 3 passes I've got a seedbed of fine powder. If the ground is very dry and/or hasn't been plowed for some time, it's obviously much more difficult to plow. I wish I had equpiment like a spring-toothed harrow we used in Louisiana in preparing seedbeds, but that sort of stuff just can't be found here, at least not in this part of the country.
I broadcast both my seed and my fertilizer using this gizmo:
I plant a certified seed (nationally-grown) at 20 kilos per hectar, broadcast. I wish I had photos of last year's operation when we covered the seed. We used what I called a Venezuelan rake.....a very large branch of an arbol de aceite (oil tree), weighed down with fence posts and dragged behind the tractor. :lol:
This year I've really upgraded my seed covering technology by using a large, square frame of metal tubing with hurricane fencing attached.
It gets the job done and covers the seed better than the Venezuelan rake.
Based on what I've read on the internet, I try to have my nitrogen ready for the plants as they're reaching the 30 day point, which is when head development begins and there's a rapid uptake of nitrogen. If rainfall is right, I'll sometimes apply nitrogen in two applications but wasn't able to do so this year. I apply urea at a rate of 150 kilos per hectar.....same with fertilizer.
Fertilizer here is a crap-shoot....you buy what you can find, which is usually 10-20-20, sometimes 15-15-15. I think I've seen 0-20-20 as well but this year I found 10-20-20.
On one small area of sorghum this year (a section that was part of my failed planting but still had enough germination that I left it alone) I used a spray-on liguid fertilizer. I'm not sure how it's worked out yet. The plants have headed out and adjusting for the failure to cover the seeds, the production looks decent.
Here's some more pics for you guys to get an idea of what my process looks like.
Ready to plant:
Grain sorghum planted using surface irrigation during the summer:
Plants at about 20 days of growth:
A few harvest time scenes:
Summer time at Whitewing's place;
A little about our weather here first. We have two seasons, a dry one (summer) and a wet one (winter). Winter normally starts in May and runs through the end of the year.....though the months of June, July, and August normally give us the best rainfalls. Sept, Oct, in some years produces some decent water....Nov and December normally much less.
Summer is brutal. We sometimes go several months without a drop of rain......March/April being the worst.
My soils are mostly sandy loam and my land fairly hilly......drains/drys pretty fast. Having said that, Í've got soils in some of the 'lower' areas that are almost black and are very productive though trickier to work during the rainy season.
I'm working the ground with my Brazilian-made JD, 95 hp tractor and a 20 disc plow. When humid enough, the ground breaks up nicely and normally within 3 passes I've got a seedbed of fine powder. If the ground is very dry and/or hasn't been plowed for some time, it's obviously much more difficult to plow. I wish I had equpiment like a spring-toothed harrow we used in Louisiana in preparing seedbeds, but that sort of stuff just can't be found here, at least not in this part of the country.
I broadcast both my seed and my fertilizer using this gizmo:
I plant a certified seed (nationally-grown) at 20 kilos per hectar, broadcast. I wish I had photos of last year's operation when we covered the seed. We used what I called a Venezuelan rake.....a very large branch of an arbol de aceite (oil tree), weighed down with fence posts and dragged behind the tractor. :lol:
This year I've really upgraded my seed covering technology by using a large, square frame of metal tubing with hurricane fencing attached.
It gets the job done and covers the seed better than the Venezuelan rake.Based on what I've read on the internet, I try to have my nitrogen ready for the plants as they're reaching the 30 day point, which is when head development begins and there's a rapid uptake of nitrogen. If rainfall is right, I'll sometimes apply nitrogen in two applications but wasn't able to do so this year. I apply urea at a rate of 150 kilos per hectar.....same with fertilizer.
Fertilizer here is a crap-shoot....you buy what you can find, which is usually 10-20-20, sometimes 15-15-15. I think I've seen 0-20-20 as well but this year I found 10-20-20.
On one small area of sorghum this year (a section that was part of my failed planting but still had enough germination that I left it alone) I used a spray-on liguid fertilizer. I'm not sure how it's worked out yet. The plants have headed out and adjusting for the failure to cover the seeds, the production looks decent.
Here's some more pics for you guys to get an idea of what my process looks like.
Ready to plant:
Grain sorghum planted using surface irrigation during the summer:
Plants at about 20 days of growth:
A few harvest time scenes:
Summer time at Whitewing's place;
Mike
Well-known member
Nice!!!!!
3 M L & C
Well-known member
LazyWP said:
Are you serious about no fertilizer deeper than two inches? :???:
3 M L & C said:
He could be. My experience with grain sorghum is that the root system is extremely shallow. I've seen plants growing in sparsely-populated areas get blown over flat on the ground by the wind from a shower.
3 M L & C
Well-known member
Whitewing said:
I was being a bit sarcastic. Milo will root down a mile if right conditions. If ground is hard as heck for instance where trucks get parked on edge of field it's pretty lazy and will fall over and not put root down.
Brad S said:
At the time I'm preparing my seedbed, moisture usually isn't a problem as I'm plowing as the rainy season begins. And yes, I broadcast my seed because that's the equipment I have available.
Another question. I've got a weighted roller that I pull behind my tractor after planting and covering bermuda. It gives me a nice smooth surface and sort of seals the surface which I'm sure cuts down on moisture loss. Could I use that same device after I've covered my milo seed or would the seal it forms possibly interfere with the seedlngs breaking through the surface?
Finally, on the question of another crop I could rotate, I've considered soybeans though Í guess I'd need a drill. I've never produced a crop of soybeans and know very little about it. From what I understand though, soybeans are fairly drought-resistent and would, of course, help with nitrogen fixing. And soybeans, with proper processing, would certainly add significant protein to the animal feeds I'm preparing for my clients.
Thanks again for the suggestions and questions.
If you're saving for a drill this might be worth a look. You try it and tell me how it works! We've got the power harrow part, and it's an unbelievable machine. Just need the air drill to attach to it. Could be quite a time saving device.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcaGGuQuGCo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcaGGuQuGCo