Air July 16, 2003

Thank you Gary, and good morning everyone. With county fair a week away, is it any wonder it's hot and dry! I will be tied up with fair most of this week and all of next week, but if you have a major crop production problem do not hesitate to call me. We could be seeing outbreaks of soybean aphids and if this happens we need to monitor the situation and be ready to get on that if need be. Potato Leaf Hoppers are more than abundant right now and are really scorching up the alfalfa leaves. If you are seeing this in your fields you do need to spray.

With wheat harvest pretty well wrapped up we are already starting to try to get seed lined up for this fall. Now, let me just remind you that even though its still 7 weeks away, remember that we are having a preplant wheat school on Wednesday evening, September 3rd. So what varieties should you be planting this fall? Well, I have been seeing a lot of the variety test plot results coming through my email and it's been very interesting so far. We've got about three old standards that we've had halfway in the grave for the past couple of years and simply refuse to die. Karl 92, Jagger and 2137 just keep hanging in there. A couple of others, 2145 and 2174 are also showing up pretty good this year but proceed with caution on either of these. I would tend to keep my balance on any of these varieties and not invest too much in either one of these. And a blend of say Jagger and 2137 or those two plus Dominator may not be too bad of a bet. Now, keep in mind that if you use a blend, it is terminal. You do not save the seed back for another year and the reason being is that you won't have the same ratio of varieties. If you started with a 3 way blend and two excelled that year, then all of a sudden you have a predominance of those two. What about something new? AgriPro has a couple of new varieties that have looked REALLY good the past couple of years, Jagalene and Cutter. Of those, Jagalene is probably better suited to our area. There is a new variety from K-State that is supposed to be going to the certified seed growers this year and generally available next that appears to be even better than Jagalene in central Kansas. So far it is only known as KS940786-6-7, but rumor mill says that on release it will be called Overly. Keep your eyes out for this one in another year. So, there's a few considerations for this fall -call me if you have any questions!

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

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