AIR APRIL 21, 1999

Thank you Mark, and good morning everyone. I just love April weather like we’ve been having. It really brings home the old adage, If you don’t like the weather just wait a little bit and it will change. Soil temperatures that were doing so well early last week took a nose dive by the end of the week. They started back up again Sunday and Monday of this week, now we’ll see what the end of the week brings us. By the time the clouds cleared last week just about every one in the county had had 3 inches of rain and parts of the county had received double that or more! And believe it or not, most of the bluestem pastures are just now ready to burn. If you’ve already burned then you are obvivously managing for purposes other than preferred warm season grasses. Remember - you get what you manage for, not what you want or expect. But that discussion could last for hours.

Alfalfa weevil are still present where they weren’t sprayed. The rain knocked a few down and drowned them but the cold certainly didn’t hurt them. I’ve seen unsprayed fields turning white already. That damage will last all season long. Keep checking fields that have been sprayed once for additional infestation. And if you haven’t sprayed yet and you still have weevils AND alfalfa get those fields sprayed as well. How long does spray need to be on before rain to do any good? The general rule of thumb is 24 hours. Depending on the conditions less than 24 hours may still be okay, but you really need to monitor those fields closely where rainfall occurred in less than 24 hours and where it was less than 6 hours you need to keep a real close watch.

We’re still waiting for the 1999 Bluestem Pasture report to be released. I am expecting that soemtime next week and will get the information out to everyone just as soon as it is in. I expect prices to be stable or up slightly. We never seem to see pasture rates mirror the changes in livestock or crop prices. We do find that rental rates tend to track land values more closely and pasture land values were virtually flat in the Flint Hills region from 98 to 99 so I don’t expect much change in rental rates. I guess we’ll know soon enough. The land value report has been released with most land in our area being stable or up or down about 1% or less. See me for a complete copy of the report.

This is Chuck Otte, Geary county Extension Agent, with Ag Outlook '99.

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