Air June 11, 2003

Thank you Gary, and good morning everyone. Well, we are finally going to get some Kansas summer weather. And to be right honest, while the wheat was enjoying the cooler weather, everything else needed some heat.

We are rapidly moving towards wheat harvest and as you are cutting your wheat you are going to be looking at varieties for planting this fall. What should you be looking for and what should you expect. I think we have seen again this year that we may have more yield potential than we are managing for. We may be underplanting our populations and most of us are under fertilizing. The days of 60 pounds of nitrogen for a wheat crop are probably history. Given the varieties we are planting and the locations we are putting them, we may need to be thinking about nitrogen rates as high as 120 pounds per acre. Disease resistance is always going to be a big question. We have to have soil borne and spindle streak mosaic resistance. Many of the wheats from states west and north of here just don't have that because these two diseases are not an issue. Leaf Rust is always going to be a problem and I think we can pretty well expect to face Stripe Rust from here on out. If you are in or moving towards no or reduced till we need to give more consideration to tan spot resistance as well. Are there varieties out there that have these packages? Yes, but most of them are just now coming on the market in any quantity this year. Some of our standby varieties like Karl and Jagger are really getting hammered by leaf rust right now. In their defense they do have good stripe rust resistance and stripe rust has the potential to be a much more destructive disease than leaf rust. 2137 has pretty well lost any rust resistance but 2145 is still hanging in there, although it really isn't the pretties twheat in the world and gets hammered by tan spot. There are some private varieties out there that have looked good the past year or two in K-State's tests and I suspect that they will again this year when that data comes out. Jagger and Cutter are two that come to mind, but once we get this year's variety test results in, we can refine those picks just a little bit. Wheat planting isn't that far away, so you need to start thinking about it now!

This is Chuck Otte, Geary County Extension Agent, with Ag Outlook 2003.

Return to Radio Home Page

Return to Ag Home Page