AIR October 13, 1999

Thank you Mark, and good morning everyone. You can sure tell it’s autumn in Kansas. Every day is a whole new experience in weather. The one good thing about the weather of late is that it has been primarily rain free so that a lot of field work can be done in a timely manner. Give us a few more days of this weather than another inch of rain to settle the dust.

With crops getting harvested in a much more timely manner than last year’s frostless October we have more opportunities to plant wheat into standing stubble. One thing that we’ve seen in recent years is serious yield depression when wheat is notilled into sorghum stubble. We don’t see the same thing following soybeans but sorghum stubble is literally death on wheat plants. If you can till the stubble even some it helps. If you have to plant wheat into sorghum stubble increase the seeding rate to about 120 pounds per acre and nitrogen rates to about 100 pounds per acre. Given the price of wheat and the extra cost invloved here, you may be better off just not planting wheat into sorghum stubble. One question that I seem to get a lot of this time of year goes something like this. I’m going to start planting wheat tomorrow, how much starter fertilizer do I need? Well, with that much information and time I’m inclined to reply - gosh, how much do you want to put on? Seriously, it’s a shot in the dark without a soil test. We know that nitrogen needs are going to be pretty consistent. Given the rain this spring and the growth we had, carryover nitrogen is pretty depleted. Sooo, depending on the long term history of the field you may need total nitrogen of anywhere from 60 to 100 pounds. Phosphorus gets to be tricky though. If you’ve been putting on some starter every year, you’re probably not too deficient so 20 or 30 pounds will probably do you. But you may have a lot of phosphorus built up in the soil, and in that case you’d need no starter. Or, if you haven’t been applying much starter, you may have a real deficient soil and you may need 60 pounds and in with the seed. But if you’re going to be planting tomorrow we don’t have time for a test so put down 20 or 30 pounds and then first thing after harvest get a soil test done so we aren’t fumbling around for answers next fall!

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

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