Airing October 14 - 21, 2005

Legume credit for the following crop

This is Ag Outlook 2005 on 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte, Geary County, K-State Research and Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent. One way that we can reduce the nitrogen requirements for a crop is to use the nitrogen credits from a legume grown as a previous crop. Legumes and manure were about the only ways to get nitrogen in the ground 50 or so years ago. Now, all too often we view manure as a waste product and legumes are only used if we are tearing up an old stand of alfalfa or we are following soybeans. So let's look at those two source of nitrogen. Soybeans are currently our #2 crop in Geary County so this is something that will work well in a rotation. But keep a few things in mind. Regardless of the yield of the soybeans, we are probably only going to get 20 pounds of nitrogen the year following beans, maybe 30 if it was a really good stand, and if you are immediately following beans with wheat, you'd better not plan on any. Bluntly, we've been giving way too much nitrogen credit following bean crops, and what we've found out over the years is that we just can't expect that much out of the soybeans. Alfalfa, on the other hand, can give us some very high nitrogen yields, approaching 100 pounds per acre but only IF a few things occur. First of all, it still has to be a vigorous stand of alfalfa with 6 to 8 plants per square foot. Secondly, it can not have been taken over by grass. If you've got a 7 year old stand that's as much crabgrass and foxtail as it is alfalfa, then you might as well pencil in a big fat 0. The annual grasses that are prone to invade old stands of alfalfa will very quickly use up all the nitrogen that the alfalfa put out there, and it isn't going to be available for the next crop. Sure, those legumes put N in the ground, but it's still something you have to manage for! This has been Ag Outlook 2005 on the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte.

Cheat in Wheat

This is Ag Outlook 2005 on 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte, Geary County, K-State Research and Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent. As the wheat fields start to green up and the drills start to get idle, many wheat producers are going to be thinking about that stupid cheat that's been making a move back into some of these fields. While rotation is still the best way to deal with cheat, and it's cousins, there are some herbicide options, that quite frankly, often sound much better than they really are. The cheat herbicides, which include Finesse Grass and Broadleaf, Maverick, Olympus and Olympus Flex are most effective when applied in the fall. Additionally, they will have fewer rotational restrictions when they are fall applied. However, you need to be aware of a few things. First of all, you need to know what weedy grass you are really fighting. What many producers call cheat, may in fact be cheat, or it could be downey brome, Japanese brome, in fact you may also be dealing with Italian ryegrass, or jointed goatgrass. And don't be confused and think that you can deal with a feral rye problem with these products also. Before you spend good money on a cheat herbicide, make sure you know what you are dealing with. Several products provide excellent control of cheat and Japanese brome, but are quite weak on downey brome. All the products and some broadleaf herbicides will control Italian Ryegrass, but not jointed goatgrass and certainly not Rye. Only Beyond herbicide with a Clearfield wheat can deal with goatgrass or feral rye. So if you are stuck in continuous wheat and are fighting a grassy weed problem, let's figure out what it is and then we can determine our control options! This has been Ag Outlook 2005 on the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte.

Causes of poor wheat stands

This is Ag Outlook 2005 on 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte, Geary County, K-State Research and Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent. I'm seeing a lot of fields start to show those first sprouts of wheat, or coleoptiles as we agronomists like to say. And hopefully we've gotten just enough rain to match up with the soil moisture conditions to get these stands up and going good before cold weather slows them down. But all to regularly we will wind up with uneven stands or poor stands in part of the field. While the first inclination may be to blame insects or disease, we are often better served to consider other factors. The first and easiest thing to check for is soil crusting. If the soil is crusted at the surface and as you dig around you find seeds that germinated and started to grow, then crusting was probably the culprit. Was there good seed to soil contact? If the ground was too cloddy or too wet or a lot of residue, then the seed may not have good seed soil contact and poor germination or poor stand establishment is the result. How about the planting depth. Wheat should be planted 1 to 2 inches deep. Deeper than that and it may not have a long enough coleoptile to reach the surface. Shallower than that and the crown may be exposed and a good root system can't develop. This year, given the weather we can't rule out hot soils. When soil surface temperature is above 90, wheat seedlings don't develop very well. Once we've run through those possibilities we can then start looking at things like herbicide carryover. Atrazine is the most common culprit here. And finally let's look at wireworms eating the seed or fall armyworms feeding on young plants. And if you just can't figure it out, give me a call and I'll get to work on it! This has been Ag Outlook 2005 on the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte.

This is Ag Outlook 2005 on 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte, Geary County, K-State Research and Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent.

This has been Ag Outlook 2005 on the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte.

This is Ag Outlook 2005 on 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte, Geary County, K-State Research and Extension Ag & Natural Resources Agent.

This has been Ag Outlook 2005 on the Talk of JC, 1420 KJCK, I'm Chuck Otte.

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