June 13, 2025 • 34 mins
After a short break, we're back in the field—and back on the mic—for our first monthly update of the season. In this episode, hosts Bill Backus and Jeff Mueller reflect on what they’ve seen across the region throughout May and share insights to help growers stay ahead as June kicks off. From early stand evaluations to fast-growing soybeans and prepping for post-emerge applications, this is your boots-on-the-ground briefing for the month ahead.
Key Takeaways:
- Now is the time to get out and do stand counts—know what emerged vs. what you planted.
- Evaluate planter performance to spot issues with row cleaners, closing wheels, or residue.
- Assess how your weed control program is working—especially if a retailer is spraying for you. Timeliness is key!
- The best weeds to kill are the ones that aren't there.
Disclaimer:
Liberty, Outlook , Zidua, Zidua PRO , Poncho Votivo Precise, Endura , Revytek, Fastac CS, ILEVO , Vault IP Plus , Relenya , Priaxor , Liberty ULTRA , are registered trademarks of BASF. Nemasphere, Zorina and Voraxor are trademarks of BASF. Enlist, Enlist One, Enlist Duo, and Enlist E3 are registered trademarks of Corteva Agriscience LLC. The transgenic event in Enlist E3 soybeans is jointly developed and owned by Corteva Agriscience LLC and M.S. Technologies, L.L.C.
Xitavo is a registered trademark of MS Technologies and exclusively distributed by BASF. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners and use of any such trademark does not imply any affiliation with or endorsement by its owner.
Always read and follow label directions. Before mixing components, always conduct a compatibility jar test. Always consult respective product labels for specific mixing instructions. The most restrictive label applies. Fastac CS is a restricted use pesticide. Nemasphere, Zorina, and Voraxor are not registered and not available for sale. This information is provided for educational purposes only and is not intended to promote the sale of this product. Any sale of this product after registration is obtained shall be based solely on the EPA approved product label, and any claims regarding product safety and efficacy shall be addressed solely by the label. The views expressed by BASF employees and Guest are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of BASF. Grow Smart is a registered trademark of BASF. Copyright 2025 BASF Corporation. All Rights Reserved.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to Spilling the Beans, the podcast that
spills the secrets to unlockingyour soybean farm's full
potential.
Every Tuesday, your hosts, billBackus and Jeff Mueller, dive
into expert strategies andinnovative solutions that will
help you boost your yields andmaximize your returns.
Whether you're a seasonedgrower or new to soybean farming
, we're here to help you succeed.
Let's get started.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Spilling the
Beans.
I'm Jeff Mueller.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
And I'm Bill Backus.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And thanks again for joining us as we dive into the
world of soybeans, coveringvarious topics and providing
insights to the soybean industry.
Bill, it's been a while how youdoing my man.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, it's been a while .
Yeah, we, you know wepre-recorded everything there
through March and all those werethrough April.
And boy it's been April, andMay has been a busy, busy, busy,
fast-paced couple of months.
But yeah, we'll definitely begood to talk about a little
recap here and kind of sharethat episode here today.
So how about yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Yeah, been good, been good, Got a little sun, still
no hair, but I got a little sun.
Still no hair, but I got alittle sun.
You know we've had, uh, hadthat going on a little bit this
year, but you know, yeah, it'sbeen good, you know it.
Like I said, it's been at leasta good five weeks since we
talked.
You know we've been in the justthe heat of this this plant
season that we had, um, it'sbeen, it's been a crazy spring
(01:23):
already.
You know all the what we've had, with storms, in some area it's
record dry, some areas it'srecord wet, and and everywhere
in between and we've, you know,storms we've had, and then the
wind and you just it's uh, youknow, we always talk about it.
Well, you know, be nice to havea normal year.
Well, every year is differentanymore.
(01:43):
But uh, yeah, it's, it's beenyou know and we were talking
about this, you know, the otherday about, hey, you know we need
to get another one out becauseduring the summer months, you
know we're not going to be goingweekly, we're going to be going
monthly and kind of recappingwhat we're seeing, what we've
seen going on in the fieldsthrough the past month, and then
you know what are some of thethings that we're potentially
going to run into in theupcoming month.
(02:04):
Hopefully our listeners takesome information from there,
some thoughts.
Hey, I need to be thinkingabout this a little bit and
going on from there, so I'll getback to me here in a little bit
.
But for you, you know what'syour plant season been like?
What's spring been like in yourarea?
You know, I know mostlycovering in the Iowa but kind of
your portion of the world.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, it was a really good question and as we got
rocking and rolling there, youknow, first, second week of
April and a lot of stuff gothammered in there early April, a
lot of people started withsoybeans, which was, you know,
music to our ears and my ears aswell, as we've been talking
about that.
You know, planting soybeansearly and I can't tell you how
(02:45):
many people are coming up andsaying, hey, my beans look great
.
I mean early beans look awesome.
You know, thanks forrecommending that and that's the
big piece of that puzzle.
A few of the guys did get somecorn in early.
Some fields look really good,some don't look so good.
Some are definitely uneven.
You're seeing some of theerrors of planting corn first
and kind of getting after it,but some of it does look pretty
(03:06):
good.
You got to be honest.
We had pretty good conditions,things got rolling.
We had a nice open April andguys.
We had more people doneprobably in two weeks, because
planter size continues to getbigger and bigger, and more guys
done in a couple of weeks thanI think I've ever seen, and me
personally for all the trials,like you and I do, I had 90 plus
(03:29):
percent of them in by end ofApril or early May, which I've
never had in all my years thatmany done that quickly.
It was nice to see.
Now, not all of our third-partyones were in, but most of them
were in.
I think we still got maybe oneor two that have not been
planted in yet closer to thenorth and some stuff out of
state that we're still waitingon to get in, but from the east
(03:52):
to the west, if you will.
So eastern part of the statedefinitely sitting pretty decent
.
They got some really nice rainsand if you go ahead and pull up
the drought monitor, which Idid this morning and kind of
looked at that, you can see theeastern part of the state of
Iowa is completely out.
The western part is still in alittle bit.
But again, we just did get somenice recent rains here.
That will definitely starthelping us pull some things out
(04:14):
of that D1 category and some D2.
But for the most part.
Really things.
Emergence looks good, standcounts look pretty good.
Overall we get stuff anywherefrom on beans, you know, just
coming up literally.
I just was at a plot thismorning, uh, they were just
playing them.
They're really just now pokingthrough uh all the way to
probably v4, v5 already, uh,maybe a little farther on a few
(04:38):
plots and sites that wereplanted early.
But yeah, corn wise, uh, yeah,corn's anywhere from, uh, some
stuff just, you know, got inkind of late as well, all the
way to, you know, v6, 7, and V8.
I mean we've got stuff all overthe board.
So I'd say overall, you knowwe've had it's been the windiest
year on record, the windiestspring on record for us.
So they came out and said thathere a while back and through
(05:01):
May, you know things were reallynice.
You know grew nice.
You know herbicide activationwas pretty decent.
We did have some spots wherestuff got laid on and we didn't
get any rain and sat and waited,waited, waited for some
activation and get a lot of postapplications getting done here.
Some stuff just getting started, I would say here, probably
(05:22):
next week for the first pass,with a few things.
Other than that, weeds arecoming up fast.
We're happy as well.
They're rocking and rolling andgrowing.
Some of the beans that younotice are kind of a little
lackluster, not just anything,zotavo specifically.
Every bean field just kind ofslow.
(05:42):
I think some nighttimetemperatures kind of slowed some
things down just kind of slow.
Um, I think some nighttimetemperatures kind of slowed some
things down and kind of got, uh, you know, things kind of
delayed a little bit from thatgrowth stage, but for the most
part, uh, you know been beenpretty fast and furious and
pretty good spring.
So that's kind of my recap.
How about you, jeff?
What do you what you've beensaying?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
yeah, you know there's a lot of things.
We've seen some similarities but, um, you know, we really
started off this spring dry.
We were very dry.
Uh, you know, I live just northof grand island, so central
part of the state and coverednebraska and kansas group, and
again we were dry.
A lot of things you said, um,beans, a lot of beans, went in
first.
A lot of farmers are startingto say, hey, I'm gonna get my
beans in first and go with that,and again, those beans look
(06:22):
amazing.
They really do.
Um, like I said, they've gotnice size and I've heard more
farmers comment on their howtheir field of beans look this
year versus in years past andnot, like I said, not Arzitavo
stuff mainly, but you know, just, they went in early, they got
things in and they gotestablished well and they're
just really happy how thingswent from that standpoint.
(06:43):
But you know, we were very dry.
In fact, one thing we areblessed with over here in the
West is groundwater and pivots,and we had a lot of fields that
we had to start the pivots onand start watering them just to
get seeds to germinate.
We were so dry.
If you look at a weather stationthat's only located maybe two
(07:04):
miles away from my house.
On May 15th we had, since thefirst year we'd only had
three-quarters of an inch ofmoisture.
Oh wow, four and a half months,okay, and in the last two weeks
it's rained quite a bit, butGod bless us with some nice
rains.
And you know, we just came outof Memorial Day and it was one
(07:26):
of the coldest and wettestMemorial Days we had and a lot
of people went out camping.
But again, so it's.
You said.
You know we're in really dryconditions, but the rainfall is
coming.
It's really helped out.
Now there's still some spotsthat have missed and scattered.
From there I would say corncrop and bean crop look great.
If you were able to get somemoisture out there with some
herbicides and herbicides outthere and you were able to help
water them in.
(07:47):
Activation is very good.
There's a few that obviouslygot sprayed and they didn't get
any moisture for two or three,four weeks.
Didn't work as well.
But again, there's a lot ofthings going on.
I would say what I'm seeing outhere as of today because well,
and the other thing too, thewind has been terrible.
We actually had replantsituations here in nebraska and
nothing was due to it being toowet.
(08:08):
It was because we caught 50 to60 mile an hour winds and we
just sandblasted everything offright on top of the ground.
So we had to go back in andreplant due to sandblasting.
So we didn't lose anything todamping off or ceiling disease
or anything like that, becausewe just didn't have the moisture
.
From that standpoint, um, andthen again it was hot.
It was hot for us and I meanwe've had quite a few days of of
(08:31):
85 plus to 90 degrees in apriland may.
Now last couple weeks have beencooler right.
So we're kind of doing thatroller coaster right now and
some of the things I am seeingin some beans, especially in
some of our higher ph acres, youcan start seeing some of that
high ph showing up now.
I get a little bit yellowing inthere.
You're seeing yellowing and inthe corn in spots happening too.
(08:52):
A lot of farmers had.
You know what's going on, thatnutrients didn't get right,
nitrogen or whatever.
A lot of that is the plantsready to roll and the roots just
aren't there yet and we've hadmoisture and it drives things
into the soil solution and ittakes it up.
Just a lot of telling producers, hey, it's going to be fine.
You didn't.
You're not bad on fertility,You're not bad on these things.
(09:12):
It's going to come in, but butyeah.
So overall I've been happy.
I've been really happy with theemergence and stands of both
corn and beans.
They've been really good overhere for us this year.
Um, I it's going to be.
If we can get some rain to thisand we can take care of this
crop, it's going to be.
It's looking as good right nowin the fields as I've seen it in
(09:33):
quite a few years.
So, um, that's always a goodthing to see, but yeah so yeah
we're really, we're really happywith how everything is and we
just need mother nature to.
Uh, you know, now we could usesome warmer weather, some
sunshine, and you know, giveMother Nature to.
You know, now we can use somewarmer weather, some sunshine,
and, you know, give us some rainevery.
You know, just, all you got todo is just give us an inch and a
half of rain every two weeks,two-day rain, and then go back
up to 85, sunshine in two weeks.
(09:53):
And we do that.
Everybody will be happy.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
Everybody will be happy, yep.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
Everybody will be happy.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Ask and you shall receive.
So yep, there you go.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
And we talked to a lot of our fellow counterparts.
Well, and I would also say,like all my plots, a lot of my
plots got in still a few thirdparties, but it's been a great
year to get plots in.
In fact, like you were saying,with equipment, 24 row
equipment- a lot of acres in oneday from that standpoint.
But a lot of plots have gone inin timely fashion, so things are
looking great.
But talking to some of ourcounterparts and you know you're
(10:25):
watching the news and thatwe've been pretty lucky over
here in kind of that middle towestern part of the of the Corn
Belt, haven't we?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Right, you know absolutely.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Yeah, you've talked to some of the individuals over
to the west, like we get to theIllinois, indiana, ohio.
You know what are some of theconditions that you heard.
Missouri, what are some of thethings you've heard from from
your counterparts or from our?
Speaker 3 (10:47):
counterparts that you're hearing over, yeah, yeah,
so so the East?
Yeah, they're, they're behind,right.
So it's been wet and there'sprobably more replant than than
definitely you and I've had forthe Western part of the of the
Corn Belt.
And you know, if you getNorthern Illinois there's a
little bit more there.
Central is decent.
You know, counterpart, you justgot the.
We get the Farm Progress Showcoming up this year over in
Decatur.
(11:07):
He just got that planted herethe other day, excited to get
the Zatavo Showcase going overthere.
The Farm Progress Show Plug infor that, of course.
Come visit us as you get intoIndiana, ohio and points east.
For the most part they'vegotten in.
They're definitely cooler andwetter than they have been in a
(11:30):
long time.
So from what I've gathered.
So how about you?
Anything else you picked up?
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Yeah, you know, again over at my Nebraska, kansas and
South Dakota has been good.
You know they've gotten thingsin Iowa, but then you get to
like Missouri.
You get parts of Missouri, moreof the eastern Missouri and
then you get more of thatsouthern Illinois.
I can do my counterpart overthere.
You know, as of a week agothere were some guys who hadn't
even turned a wheel yet to getin.
You know I was hearing, whetherit's true or not.
(11:57):
I was hearing some areas hadlike upwards of 20 to 25 inches
of rain since the first of April, so like in a two-month period
period.
So that isn't too inclusive togetting seed put in the ground.
So um, but again, um, the onething we always like to caution.
You know there's been somequestions.
Uh, they've been getting.
You know, should I, should Iswitch maturity on my corn?
(12:19):
Should I switch maturity on mybeans?
Whatever, you know those are,those are conversations to have
with your BSF agronomist, agSolutions Advisor, business Rep,
other industry people thatyou're talking with.
But you know a lot of times youreally don't need to switch,
you just need to be able to getgoing when you can go.
Now, again, we get at that timeframe.
You know we're at the first ofJune right now.
(12:42):
We get that last week of May,first of June, that's when a lot
of things start hitting the fana little bit on.
Okay, what do we need to switch?
But here's the other thing tooAre you going to be able to get
the corn and the beans that youneed to switch to?
Because we know, with the typeof fall we had last year, a lot
of the germs on beans there wasa lot of lot.
Numbers of beans didn't make itbecause it was so hot and dry.
(13:04):
You know they were coming outof the field at seven percent
moisture, eight percent as lowas the moisture tester would go.
So the quality on some of thebeans wasn't as good from in the
industry.
So you know there just mightnot be that to fix in from there
.
So but uh, but yeah, overall, Ithink, uh, I think you know
everything's going good for us.
And again, uh, we were hopingeverything goes good for them
over there and they geteverything in a timely fashion
(13:26):
and would work great from there,yeah, so so we had uh, south
dakota, north dakota, minnesota,wisconsin, basically into that
and points north there.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Uh, you know they were there.
I talked counterpart up northdakota here yesterday, the day
before.
I lose track now, but yeah theywere just finishing up a few
things.
so they're just uh, they gotsome stuff in nice and early and
then they kind of had somepause, and you know we always
joke that the snow finally cameoff and melted up there, you
know somewhere in there, andthen they just stopped ice
fishing up there, not that longago, right, so but yeah, it's,
(13:58):
you know they've got to thepoint where you know a lot of
the other crops that they havesugar beets and canola and
soybeans, and you know, you nameit.
They've got toets and canola andsoybeans, and you know you name
it.
They've got that in winterwheat and whatnot, to get all
that kind of taken care of.
So anyway, things are lookingpretty good for them as well
from that standpoint.
(14:18):
But again, that germ discussionhit them really hard.
So there was a lot ofgermination problems, especially
for that northern part of theyou know corn belt, if you will
as well.
So you know, hats off to themfor getting what they could and
getting in the ground to raisecrops, absolutely, absolutely
Every year.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
It's a challenge, but it always seems to get in
eventually, right, every once ina while maybe not, but it'll
usually get in.
So we spent the first 15minutes.
You know we've just been kindof recapping what we've kind of
gone through or what we've seenin the areas and that you know
the reality of this.
Probably this podcast is abenefit more for the producers.
Hey, what are some of thethings that we need to be
looking for here in the month ofJune?
(14:56):
Right, what's coming up in thenext 30 days before our next
podcast gets released?
You know, what are some of the?
What are some of the expectedthings that producers are going
to need to do?
What are maybe some of thepotential expected challenges
that can come in?
Or where we at from?
Maybe a herbicide or disease,or what are just some of those
(15:20):
things in your area that you'reworking with your producers,
that you're looking out for thathere in the next month coming
along?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
So I literally just did a customer training this
morning and it's one of thethings we talked about very,
very specifically, yeah, yeah,so I literally just did a
customer training this morningand it's one of the things we
talked about very, veryspecifically.
So I kind of I'll go back anddo a little.
You know we didn't do a storytime, so we'll do a little bit
of a story time here.
I think it'll fit right here asyou kind of go back into.
You know, let's do six yearsago, so 2019, we'll start with
(15:45):
that.
So 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 24,so on, so forth.
So 2019, what was it like forus?
We actually had pretty goodmoisture.
It wasn't a big drought likewe've been used to for the past
couple years.
You know, 2020, things kind ofstarted to get a little drier 21
, a little drier, 22, a littledrier and 23 really wham right
(16:06):
for a lot of dry, of dry.
And then 24, we got some decentrains.
Remember last spring itactually got pretty good rains.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
And then it turned dry again.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
And now we're back.
Now we're back to having somerains again.
So what to look forward to isyou've got to think.
Recap that you know.
I did you know I can't reallycite the source on this.
But I did see the long rangeforecast for June, july and
August, really for the entireMidwest, which was below normal
(16:35):
temps and above normal precepts,so which is weird for us.
So that's what I saw.
So that's one source.
That's why I say I don't wantto, I don't want to go into all
that, but either way you thinkabout it, you haven't had rain
for a long time.
I haven't had all this rain fora long time.
The east hasn't had this muchrain for a long time.
(16:56):
So, either way, we've gotmoisture coming in and we've got
a potentially wet June on ourhands, you know, wetter than we
have, right.
So put all that together.
What are you thinking about?
You're thinking about, you know, my seed treatments running out
of gas now, so we've had thoseon, usually get about 30 to 45
days out of those.
(17:18):
So what infections are going tostart happening?
Well, that fusarium is going tostart coming in, if it hasn't
already, and that's where SDS,you know, starts coming in, and
so that's really why we talkedabout Alevo.
There's been one big part ofthat, right.
So that's one thing to be, youknow, be cognizant of and be
alerted of that if you didn'tyou know, put some SDS you know
(17:39):
seed treatment protected on.
Or if you have a soybean variety, for example, that's not very
strong in SDS, you know, targetthose fields and watch them, you
know, especially for harvest,because they're going to be some
ones that might be prone.
You know, the next thing wetalked about this morning was
really just fungicides, right.
(18:00):
So we're starting to thinkabout okay, as crops we're at,
you know we'll come back to theweeds and the post herbicide and
all that stuff, but thinkforward to the end of the month
and you know, into uh, all july,there, you know where do we
need to start thinking about funbesides man.
What's our timing right?
So if we think about I like totalk about white mold being an
odd year pest, 2019, 21, 23 andnow 25 that's when we've had our
(18:27):
white mold pressure.
And yeah you're most likelygoing back on those fields where
you have that high pressure too.
So definitely keep those inmind and be watching those.
You know we do have someproducts Endura, we're going to
be talking about it, endura Prothis year is a possible trial
use.
So definitely reach out to BASFfor rep, try and get some of
(18:49):
that.
Basically it's a two compound,two AI product.
And then we're going to nextyear, 2026, we'll be talking
about Zarina, our new white moldfungicide.
So definitely some things thatare coming in the pipeline that
we want to be talking about andthinking about.
Of course you know our Revitecor our Veltema, you know for the
R3 application, then of corn,of course you know VT
(19:12):
application with that, but lotsof moisture, lots of humidity,
more humidity than what we'vehad in a long time, and I assume
you've got that as well, jeff.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
So I think we're yeah , we don't get humidity out.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Yeah, we're set up for that.
So I think a lot of things froma fungicide perspective is what
I really wanted to talk abouttoday was, I think those are the
things to think about goingforward just because of, you
know, tar spots coming in onyour eastern side.
We got a lot of tar spot herein Iowa and tar spots you know
throughout the rest of the CornBelt, so definitely something to
keep our eye on.
(19:42):
You know frog eye leaf spot onsoybeans.
You know you get into northerncorn leaf light.
Based on the corn You've got agreat leaf spot We've got to
keep our eye on.
All these types of funguses aregoing to be more prevalent if
we have to moisture.
Basically, we've got thatdisease triangle.
(20:02):
We've talked about the yieldtriangle, but we've got the host
pathogen in the environment.
Now We've got those ready torock and roll.
That's the big thing we talkedabout today.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
But how about you?
Speaker 3 (20:13):
What about herbicides ?
What do you see in there?
What about weed size?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yeah, you know just to follow back on a little bit
with that.
I agree with you on the suddendeath and the white mold.
You know, if you think about it, when do you usually get that
Fusarium gets in those roots?
It's early in the soybeans.
Everybody ties in sudden deathwith.
You know that end part of Julyinto the first part of August
and it really is infecting kindof that V2 stage right, v1, v2
(20:39):
in the beans gets going early,right.
Well, you think about earlybeans we had planted this year
and how we were able to getstuff in early.
What kind of weather did wehave at V1, v2 in our soybeans?
Wet and cool, right.
What's ideal for fusariumcoming to bean roots, right?
So that's something I thinkthey really keep an eye out on
for and we'll know in a couplemonths.
And then the white mold, theopportunity for white mold to
(21:02):
come in this year.
And again, like you said,endura, and you know we always
talk like R1, right, firstflower spray, summer solstice,
you know 21st of June, but youknow, in reality I like that If
you're going to go aftersomething with Endura for a
white mold product, you know,once you hit that first flower,
wait a week to 10 days beforeyou spray, let's get all those
(21:23):
flowers, because white moldcomes in through the dead
flowers and if there's just oneflower coming out and we're
spraying, we've got all theseother ones that still need to
come out.
So you know what's that first.
You know basically that firstof July timeframe, but if it's
flowering the 21st of June kindof time from there.
Herbicides I touched on them alittle bit earlier but again, if
you were able to get moistureout there whether man-made or
(21:44):
whether through Mother Nature,on your herbicide program out
there on some of these pre's itworked really well.
Do have some fields out therethat had a pre put on and sat
there three weeks without anymoisture on it, and you know the
reality of it is just didn'tget a lot of it activated from
that standpoint of it is justdidn't get a lot of it activated
(22:05):
from that standpoint.
So there's a few fields therethat aren't as happy with what
we had, but it wasn't due toapplicator error or any, or
farmer error, it was we justcouldn't get water to it,
moisture on to help activate it,and we had 90 degree
temperatures too at those timestoo.
So right, that's the old, but ifyou think about it, a lot of
the pre's are running out rightnow a lot of the pre's that we
put down, unless it's lateplanted field, late sprayed,
they're running out right now.
(22:25):
You figure once you spray yougot about 30-35 days and you
might be getting back in thatfield but down that next layer
of the pre.
So really this week, uh, we give, we had some, we're having some
rain, but once it dries out,I've been telling the producers
you know, get in there, get thatsecond shot going in.
They're going in with a shot ofliberty ultra out there or some
other, uh, liberty 280,whatever they're using.
(22:45):
And then I'm telling them, puta good residual in there and
making sure we're putting theright things in in that field,
right, because we need to getthat later out there.
For some reason, someindividuals think that they
don't want to spend the money ortake the time to spray when
there's no weeds out there andthey want to wait till weeds are
there.
That's when they're hardest tokill.
They're easiest to kill whenthey're not there and you're
putting a layer of residual outthere.
(23:06):
So again, that's something tobe thinking about.
A lot of posting on corn isgoing to be going on here once
it's dry enough to get in there.
A lot of the corn has hit thatv5 stage, um, and it's in it's
and it's ready just to boltright, right, ready side
dressing.
That's going to be going on.
One thing to keep in mind I'vealready started to see it in a
couple fields Once we warm up,we've got the moisture, the corn
(23:29):
is at that V5 when it's readyto roll.
There's a lot of potential forrapid growth seen in corn and if
you're using a dicamba productthat isn't as safe on the corn
as like a status, you might tiethat thing up pretty tight, wrap
it up pretty tight, um, andyou're going to just be clear
status is, status is safe.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
To be clear on status is safe, exactly, status is
safe but if.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
But if you haven't, you might have feel that there's
nothing's been sprayed on.
It looks like it's been sprayedwith the growth regulator and
tied up.
That's going to be a rapidgrowth syndrome.
It'll usually out of that.
But you want that heat and alittle bit of wind to help break
those leaves.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Apart from that standpoint, so I think that's
something here.
So every single field I droveby this morning we got rapid
growth going on right now.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
You can see it and then you'll really know when you
had it here after it has rapidgrowth.
And give it a couple weekslater and all of a sudden you'll
yellow spots out on the fieldbecause it's the leaves of
unfertile and they haven't hadthe chlorophyll.
Um, every year I get a call onit.
You know my corn's dying,what's going on, let's give a
little time, it'll be okay.
But I think, from a chemistrystandpoint, yeah, now it's time
to be getting those postapplications into those corn.
(24:33):
Get down another residual inthat corn and your post
application, whether it's fiveounces of status or whatever
you're using, if you're usingsome glyphosate out there for
grasses really that's our bestthing make sure we have our
additives.
And then in the beans right nowit's probably time to you know.
If you planted that last weekof April, first week of May,
it's time to be spraying thatsecond layer of residual out
(24:53):
there and coming in with thatpost application out there and
keeping them clean is how youmaximize yield control or how
you maximize weed control.
So that's just some of thethings I'm thinking.
Now one other thing, a tiedthing I'd throw in, is have you
been noticing any white stuffflying around your area in the
last week?
A little cotton from thecottonwood trees.
Absolutely what's always the onerule of thumb Bill in this
(25:16):
industry.
We've been around here for afew years.
When you start seeing thecotton flying, what's that kind
of tell you to get patching?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
well you know um, I also ironically seen a few uh
fireflies going too so so alsohave that a little earlier than
normal, right, when you put allthat stuff together, you start
getting some corn root wormsstarting to hatch absolutely.
We are also starting to see alittle bit of soybean test
nematode starting to pop up aswell, so it.
(25:43):
It's time to start looking forthose, so yeah, they all kind of
tie together.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
You see the cotton flying, see the lightning bugs.
That's the same GDUs forhatching of the corn root worm.
Already you start seeing somecyst nematode coming out.
So those are other things too.
If you've got corn out thereand it's been a corn on corn I
know there's some individualsyou know we talked this winter
there's some individuals outthere might be going on their
third year corn on corn.
Second year I'm not too worried, but third year corn on corn.
(26:08):
If you don't have a tradedproduct or have something out
there for corn rootworm, youcould have some corn rootworm
potential.
So that would be something tokeep an eye on from that
standpoint.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Middle of June is a good time to see what's going on
.
Yeah, earlier than I thinkwe've seen in a long time.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Because it's usually cotton swine in the middle of
June.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
Right, right, exactly , exactly.
And then you know, we just gotan alert the other day for you
and I a very unique pest for us,soybean gall midge, basically
the first soybean gall midge,which again is a midge, small
little fly that basicallyattacks the base of the soybeans
and lays your larvae in thereand basically just eats her out
of the base of the stem andkills the plant.
(26:46):
From that perspective, andfirst emergence was a little
earlier as well, from that too.
So definitely with the heat,the heat units, the moisture,
kind of where we're at, we're ona tick ahead of where we
normally are.
And there's some things to kindof keep in mind.
So yeah, definitely, I'd say,within the next week or two, if
you're looking for soybean cystnematode, you should be able to
(27:08):
see the bright white female Hercyst, basically her egg sac
basically exploded through theroot on that small root.
So be digging some soybeanplants out there, start to look,
identify if you have somesoybean cyst nematode out there.
And yeah, you had mentioned,you know, r1.
No question about that, r1, r2.
Definitely get there for thatwhite mold.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
That's a big piece of that puzzle.
Question on those cystnematodes Pull the plants or dig
the plants.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Oh no, dig wide and get the big old, you know, six,
eight inches out around thatplant.
Get as much of that and be ascareful as you can, because
they're going to be on those,not on the main roots, they're
going to be on the other finerroots.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
And if you pull them out, you're just going to pull
them off.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
Yeah you're not going to see them If you go out there
and pull them out and try anddig really close, you're not
even going to find any.
You'll be like I don't find any.
I didn't see any.
So, um, you know.
And then you know it's probablya tick late to do some soil
tests, so I'd wait on that untiltill the end here.
Um, you know and see, kind ofsee where we're at.
When I say the end, I'm talkinginto september, october,
(28:12):
somewhere in there.
Start pulling an r8 now, so Iwouldn't mess around with
anything now.
But but um, you know, I did.
I did personally have to pullsome samples last week and I
couldn't get into that fieldEvery time I was there.
It was too wet and I did pullsome.
So yeah, just got the resultsback.
It was a little higher than Ithought too, which was kind of
to be expected.
Fairly sandy soil at that piecein the Des Moines Lobe All
(28:34):
right.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
So you know we've been rambling here for about a
half an hour talking back andforth and probably better be
closing this one up for some ofour listeners.
But so you know what are?
Just a couple of the mainthings, main focus points we
need to be looking at here inthe next couple of two, three
weeks, as we're, as we're goingforward.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
If you tell producers where to be focused at.
Yeah, yeah, so, first andforemost, what I'm telling
everybody is is take the time togo take your stand counts.
Now you've got a good time togo walk through those corn and
bean fields, see how you'reevaluating your plan, evaluate
what you see, you know, figureout what worked, what didn't
work, Make sure you understandwhat you have for a seeding
population, what you're actuallygrew, and just kind of get a
(29:17):
good idea.
Get out there and scout thosefields and understand what your
stand is.
It's a really good time to takethose stand counts and just say
, yep, I planted X and I've gotthis, and then that was what I
expected.
So, or I've got a problem, youknow, and I've identified that
and I can make my fixes towhatever basically, whether
that's your planter or a setup,or if you had some problems
(29:39):
getting through the trash withyour row cleaners or whatever it
may be closing wheels orwhatever you had.
Basically do some time just toreally evaluate your seeding
rate, your stand kind of.
Get that stand evaluation,Check that off your list.
That's first and foremost to me.
Take the time to go do that andthen just really evaluate.
Next one would be weed control.
While you're out there walkingthrough your fields, spend some
(30:01):
time out there to say, yeah, itlooks like this is working.
If you've got a retailerspraying for you, make sure
they're trying to get there ontime, because they've got a lot
of acres to cover too.
Especially when you get somewet acres or wet times, they're
going to have a tough timegetting there on time and rates
are going to get increased.
We have to adjust that and thenstart scouting for disease.
We'll take us to our nextepisode.
(30:23):
When we get to that, we'll betalking a lot more about disease
, I think, at that point in timewhen we get there.
So that'd be kind of the mainthings I'm looking at.
Jeff, how about yourself?
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Yeah, no, absolutely, you're spot on on everything.
And then I would add on top ofthat, that's what we're going to
be doing a lot of here in thenext few weeks.
We're doing a lot of our standcounts.
Right now we're doing, look,we're looking a lot of things,
seeing how they come up.
You know, we're working withsome new experimentals.
We're looking at that.
In fact, we we've alreadytalked here yesterday, I believe
it was about we've noticed oneproduct.
(30:52):
We're looking in the field.
We're like, hey, stands are offon that one, you can tell.
And that's, that's huge for us,because we know.
You know, if something is notdoing as well as we thought it
would, or we have somethinggoing on, we'll be like well,
you know that one was off like30 percent in a lot of the plots
and stuff like that.
So, again, it helps us tounderstand what happened or
maybe give us an idea somewhatof what happened from there.
(31:14):
But again, yeah, we're in thenext two weeks it's going to be
all about weed control, gettingthings out there, and the one
thing I would say is, if you goout to your field and it's clean
, but it's been a month sinceyou sprayed, I don't want you
out there going.
Oh hey, let's wait another 10,14 days and see where it goes,
because I promise you, when itwarms up with this moisture,
(31:35):
you'll go out there 10 days fromnow and be like, oh crap.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Where did all this come?
Speaker 2 (31:41):
from and it's a foot tall because that water hit real
fast.
So again, the best weeds tokill are the ones that aren't
there and you can layer it outfrom there.
And then again we'll be gettinginto that fungicide talk here
towards the end of the month.
But again, you know, we'regoing to hopefully have somebody
coming in another individualover our team when we do the
next podcast.
Don't know what it is.
Well, maybe we'll talk aboutfungicides, maybe we'll talk
(32:03):
about this, maybe we'll talkabout diseases we don't know.
But uh, so you're just notlistening to me and bill ramble
back and forth, we'll get yousome real experts out there to
go over the information.
But with that being said bill, Ithink we're gonna wrap it up
for the day and again.
It was great to see you againyeah yeah, five weeks, and we'll
be seeing you here off and onagain.
But with that being said, we'dlike to say thank you for
(32:24):
joining us today on this episodeof Spilling the Beans.
We invite you to download theGrow Smart Life app for
resources and share this podcastwith other growers.
So, from myself and from Bill,keep staying safe and make it a
great day.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Thanks for joining us on Spilling the Beans, where
every episode gets you one stepcloser to maximizing your
soybean profitability.
If you found today's insightsvaluable, subscribe and leave us
a review on your favoriteplatform.
Download the Grow Smart Liveapp for more resources and share
the podcast with other growers.
See you next week with moreexpert tips to help you grow
(33:36):
smarter and achieve the bestyields yet.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Transcription by CastingWords not imply any
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(34:02):
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Welcome to Spilling the Beans, the podcast that
spills the secrets to unlockingyour soybean farm's full
potential.
Every Tuesday, your hosts, billBackus and Jeff Mueller, dive
into expert strategies andinnovative solutions that will
help you boost your yields andmaximize your returns.
Whether you're a seasonedgrower or new to soybean farming
, we're here to help you succeed.
Let's get started.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
Hello and welcome to another episode of Spilling the
Beans.
I'm Jeff Mueller.
Speaker 3 (00:28):
And I'm Bill Backus.
Speaker 2 (00:30):
And thanks again for joining us as we dive into the
world of soybeans, coveringvarious topics and providing
insights to the soybean industry.
Bill, it's been a while how youdoing my man.
Speaker 3 (00:40):
Oh, it's been a while .
Yeah, we, you know wepre-recorded everything there
through March and all those werethrough April.
And boy it's been April, andMay has been a busy, busy, busy,
fast-paced couple of months.
But yeah, we'll definitely begood to talk about a little
recap here and kind of sharethat episode here today.
So how about yourself?
Speaker 2 (01:01):
Yeah, been good, been good, Got a little sun, still
no hair, but I got a little sun.
Still no hair, but I got alittle sun.
You know we've had, uh, hadthat going on a little bit this
year, but you know, yeah, it'sbeen good, you know it.
Like I said, it's been at leasta good five weeks since we
talked.
You know we've been in the justthe heat of this this plant
season that we had, um, it'sbeen, it's been a crazy spring
(01:23):
already.
You know all the what we've had, with storms, in some area it's
record dry, some areas it'srecord wet, and and everywhere
in between and we've, you know,storms we've had, and then the
wind and you just it's uh, youknow, we always talk about it.
Well, you know, be nice to havea normal year.
Well, every year is differentanymore.
(01:43):
But uh, yeah, it's, it's beenyou know and we were talking
about this, you know, the otherday about, hey, you know we need
to get another one out becauseduring the summer months, you
know we're not going to be goingweekly, we're going to be going
monthly and kind of recappingwhat we're seeing, what we've
seen going on in the fieldsthrough the past month, and then
you know what are some of thethings that we're potentially
going to run into in theupcoming month.
(02:04):
Hopefully our listeners takesome information from there,
some thoughts.
Hey, I need to be thinkingabout this a little bit and
going on from there, so I'll getback to me here in a little bit
.
But for you, you know what'syour plant season been like?
What's spring been like in yourarea?
You know, I know mostlycovering in the Iowa but kind of
your portion of the world.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
Yeah, it was a really good question and as we got
rocking and rolling there, youknow, first, second week of
April and a lot of stuff gothammered in there early April, a
lot of people started withsoybeans, which was, you know,
music to our ears and my ears aswell, as we've been talking
about that.
You know, planting soybeansearly and I can't tell you how
(02:45):
many people are coming up andsaying, hey, my beans look great
.
I mean early beans look awesome.
You know, thanks forrecommending that and that's the
big piece of that puzzle.
A few of the guys did get somecorn in early.
Some fields look really good,some don't look so good.
Some are definitely uneven.
You're seeing some of theerrors of planting corn first
and kind of getting after it,but some of it does look pretty
(03:06):
good.
You got to be honest.
We had pretty good conditions,things got rolling.
We had a nice open April andguys.
We had more people doneprobably in two weeks, because
planter size continues to getbigger and bigger, and more guys
done in a couple of weeks thanI think I've ever seen, and me
personally for all the trials,like you and I do, I had 90 plus
(03:29):
percent of them in by end ofApril or early May, which I've
never had in all my years thatmany done that quickly.
It was nice to see.
Now, not all of our third-partyones were in, but most of them
were in.
I think we still got maybe oneor two that have not been
planted in yet closer to thenorth and some stuff out of
state that we're still waitingon to get in, but from the east
(03:52):
to the west, if you will.
So eastern part of the statedefinitely sitting pretty decent
.
They got some really nice rainsand if you go ahead and pull up
the drought monitor, which Idid this morning and kind of
looked at that, you can see theeastern part of the state of
Iowa is completely out.
The western part is still in alittle bit.
But again, we just did get somenice recent rains here.
That will definitely starthelping us pull some things out
(04:14):
of that D1 category and some D2.
But for the most part.
Really things.
Emergence looks good, standcounts look pretty good.
Overall we get stuff anywherefrom on beans, you know, just
coming up literally.
I just was at a plot thismorning, uh, they were just
playing them.
They're really just now pokingthrough uh all the way to
probably v4, v5 already, uh,maybe a little farther on a few
(04:38):
plots and sites that wereplanted early.
But yeah, corn wise, uh, yeah,corn's anywhere from, uh, some
stuff just, you know, got inkind of late as well, all the
way to, you know, v6, 7, and V8.
I mean we've got stuff all overthe board.
So I'd say overall, you knowwe've had it's been the windiest
year on record, the windiestspring on record for us.
So they came out and said thathere a while back and through
(05:01):
May, you know things were reallynice.
You know grew nice.
You know herbicide activationwas pretty decent.
We did have some spots wherestuff got laid on and we didn't
get any rain and sat and waited,waited, waited for some
activation and get a lot of postapplications getting done here.
Some stuff just getting started, I would say here, probably
(05:22):
next week for the first pass,with a few things.
Other than that, weeds arecoming up fast.
We're happy as well.
They're rocking and rolling andgrowing.
Some of the beans that younotice are kind of a little
lackluster, not just anything,zotavo specifically.
Every bean field just kind ofslow.
(05:42):
I think some nighttimetemperatures kind of slowed some
things down just kind of slow.
Um, I think some nighttimetemperatures kind of slowed some
things down and kind of got, uh, you know, things kind of
delayed a little bit from thatgrowth stage, but for the most
part, uh, you know been beenpretty fast and furious and
pretty good spring.
So that's kind of my recap.
How about you, jeff?
What do you what you've beensaying?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
yeah, you know there's a lot of things.
We've seen some similarities but, um, you know, we really
started off this spring dry.
We were very dry.
Uh, you know, I live just northof grand island, so central
part of the state and coverednebraska and kansas group, and
again we were dry.
A lot of things you said, um,beans, a lot of beans, went in
first.
A lot of farmers are startingto say, hey, I'm gonna get my
beans in first and go with that,and again, those beans look
(06:22):
amazing.
They really do.
Um, like I said, they've gotnice size and I've heard more
farmers comment on their howtheir field of beans look this
year versus in years past andnot, like I said, not Arzitavo
stuff mainly, but you know, just, they went in early, they got
things in and they gotestablished well and they're
just really happy how thingswent from that standpoint.
(06:43):
But you know, we were very dry.
In fact, one thing we areblessed with over here in the
West is groundwater and pivots,and we had a lot of fields that
we had to start the pivots onand start watering them just to
get seeds to germinate.
We were so dry.
If you look at a weather stationthat's only located maybe two
(07:04):
miles away from my house.
On May 15th we had, since thefirst year we'd only had
three-quarters of an inch ofmoisture.
Oh wow, four and a half months,okay, and in the last two weeks
it's rained quite a bit, butGod bless us with some nice
rains.
And you know, we just came outof Memorial Day and it was one
(07:26):
of the coldest and wettestMemorial Days we had and a lot
of people went out camping.
But again, so it's.
You said.
You know we're in really dryconditions, but the rainfall is
coming.
It's really helped out.
Now there's still some spotsthat have missed and scattered.
From there I would say corncrop and bean crop look great.
If you were able to get somemoisture out there with some
herbicides and herbicides outthere and you were able to help
water them in.
(07:47):
Activation is very good.
There's a few that obviouslygot sprayed and they didn't get
any moisture for two or three,four weeks.
Didn't work as well.
But again, there's a lot ofthings going on.
I would say what I'm seeing outhere as of today because well,
and the other thing too, thewind has been terrible.
We actually had replantsituations here in nebraska and
nothing was due to it being toowet.
(08:08):
It was because we caught 50 to60 mile an hour winds and we
just sandblasted everything offright on top of the ground.
So we had to go back in andreplant due to sandblasting.
So we didn't lose anything todamping off or ceiling disease
or anything like that, becausewe just didn't have the moisture
.
From that standpoint, um, andthen again it was hot.
It was hot for us and I meanwe've had quite a few days of of
(08:31):
85 plus to 90 degrees in apriland may.
Now last couple weeks have beencooler right.
So we're kind of doing thatroller coaster right now and
some of the things I am seeingin some beans, especially in
some of our higher ph acres, youcan start seeing some of that
high ph showing up now.
I get a little bit yellowing inthere.
You're seeing yellowing and inthe corn in spots happening too.
(08:52):
A lot of farmers had.
You know what's going on, thatnutrients didn't get right,
nitrogen or whatever.
A lot of that is the plantsready to roll and the roots just
aren't there yet and we've hadmoisture and it drives things
into the soil solution and ittakes it up.
Just a lot of telling producers, hey, it's going to be fine.
You didn't.
You're not bad on fertility,You're not bad on these things.
(09:12):
It's going to come in, but butyeah.
So overall I've been happy.
I've been really happy with theemergence and stands of both
corn and beans.
They've been really good overhere for us this year.
Um, I it's going to be.
If we can get some rain to thisand we can take care of this
crop, it's going to be.
It's looking as good right nowin the fields as I've seen it in
(09:33):
quite a few years.
So, um, that's always a goodthing to see, but yeah so yeah
we're really, we're really happywith how everything is and we
just need mother nature to.
Uh, you know, now we could usesome warmer weather, some
sunshine, and you know, giveMother Nature to.
You know, now we can use somewarmer weather, some sunshine,
and, you know, give us some rainevery.
You know, just, all you got todo is just give us an inch and a
half of rain every two weeks,two-day rain, and then go back
up to 85, sunshine in two weeks.
(09:53):
And we do that.
Everybody will be happy.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
Everybody will be happy, yep.
Speaker 2 (09:56):
Everybody will be happy.
Speaker 3 (09:58):
Ask and you shall receive.
So yep, there you go.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
And we talked to a lot of our fellow counterparts.
Well, and I would also say,like all my plots, a lot of my
plots got in still a few thirdparties, but it's been a great
year to get plots in.
In fact, like you were saying,with equipment, 24 row
equipment- a lot of acres in oneday from that standpoint.
But a lot of plots have gone inin timely fashion, so things are
looking great.
But talking to some of ourcounterparts and you know you're
(10:25):
watching the news and thatwe've been pretty lucky over
here in kind of that middle towestern part of the of the Corn
Belt, haven't we?
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Right, you know absolutely.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
Yeah, you've talked to some of the individuals over
to the west, like we get to theIllinois, indiana, ohio.
You know what are some of theconditions that you heard.
Missouri, what are some of thethings you've heard from from
your counterparts or from our?
Speaker 3 (10:47):
counterparts that you're hearing over, yeah, yeah,
so so the East?
Yeah, they're, they're behind,right.
So it's been wet and there'sprobably more replant than than
definitely you and I've had forthe Western part of the of the
Corn Belt.
And you know, if you getNorthern Illinois there's a
little bit more there.
Central is decent.
You know, counterpart, you justgot the.
We get the Farm Progress Showcoming up this year over in
Decatur.
(11:07):
He just got that planted herethe other day, excited to get
the Zatavo Showcase going overthere.
The Farm Progress Show Plug infor that, of course.
Come visit us as you get intoIndiana, ohio and points east.
For the most part they'vegotten in.
They're definitely cooler andwetter than they have been in a
(11:30):
long time.
So from what I've gathered.
So how about you?
Anything else you picked up?
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Yeah, you know, again over at my Nebraska, kansas and
South Dakota has been good.
You know they've gotten thingsin Iowa, but then you get to
like Missouri.
You get parts of Missouri, moreof the eastern Missouri and
then you get more of thatsouthern Illinois.
I can do my counterpart overthere.
You know, as of a week agothere were some guys who hadn't
even turned a wheel yet to getin.
You know I was hearing, whetherit's true or not.
(11:57):
I was hearing some areas hadlike upwards of 20 to 25 inches
of rain since the first of April, so like in a two-month period
period.
So that isn't too inclusive togetting seed put in the ground.
So um, but again, um, the onething we always like to caution.
You know there's been somequestions.
Uh, they've been getting.
You know, should I, should Iswitch maturity on my corn?
(12:19):
Should I switch maturity on mybeans?
Whatever, you know those are,those are conversations to have
with your BSF agronomist, agSolutions Advisor, business Rep,
other industry people thatyou're talking with.
But you know a lot of times youreally don't need to switch,
you just need to be able to getgoing when you can go.
Now, again, we get at that timeframe.
You know we're at the first ofJune right now.
(12:42):
We get that last week of May,first of June, that's when a lot
of things start hitting the fana little bit on.
Okay, what do we need to switch?
But here's the other thing tooAre you going to be able to get
the corn and the beans that youneed to switch to?
Because we know, with the typeof fall we had last year, a lot
of the germs on beans there wasa lot of lot.
Numbers of beans didn't make itbecause it was so hot and dry.
(13:04):
You know they were coming outof the field at seven percent
moisture, eight percent as lowas the moisture tester would go.
So the quality on some of thebeans wasn't as good from in the
industry.
So you know there just mightnot be that to fix in from there
.
So but uh, but yeah, overall, Ithink, uh, I think you know
everything's going good for us.
And again, uh, we were hopingeverything goes good for them
over there and they geteverything in a timely fashion
(13:26):
and would work great from there,yeah, so so we had uh, south
dakota, north dakota, minnesota,wisconsin, basically into that
and points north there.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Uh, you know they were there.
I talked counterpart up northdakota here yesterday, the day
before.
I lose track now, but yeah theywere just finishing up a few
things.
so they're just uh, they gotsome stuff in nice and early and
then they kind of had somepause, and you know we always
joke that the snow finally cameoff and melted up there, you
know somewhere in there, andthen they just stopped ice
fishing up there, not that longago, right, so but yeah, it's,
(13:58):
you know they've got to thepoint where you know a lot of
the other crops that they havesugar beets and canola and
soybeans, and you know, you nameit.
They've got toets and canola andsoybeans, and you know you name
it.
They've got that in winterwheat and whatnot, to get all
that kind of taken care of.
So anyway, things are lookingpretty good for them as well
from that standpoint.
(14:18):
But again, that germ discussionhit them really hard.
So there was a lot ofgermination problems, especially
for that northern part of theyou know corn belt, if you will
as well.
So you know, hats off to themfor getting what they could and
getting in the ground to raisecrops, absolutely, absolutely
Every year.
Speaker 2 (14:35):
It's a challenge, but it always seems to get in
eventually, right, every once ina while maybe not, but it'll
usually get in.
So we spent the first 15minutes.
You know we've just been kindof recapping what we've kind of
gone through or what we've seenin the areas and that you know
the reality of this.
Probably this podcast is abenefit more for the producers.
Hey, what are some of thethings that we need to be
looking for here in the month ofJune?
(14:56):
Right, what's coming up in thenext 30 days before our next
podcast gets released?
You know, what are some of the?
What are some of the expectedthings that producers are going
to need to do?
What are maybe some of thepotential expected challenges
that can come in?
Or where we at from?
Maybe a herbicide or disease,or what are just some of those
(15:20):
things in your area that you'reworking with your producers,
that you're looking out for thathere in the next month coming
along?
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (15:24):
So I literally just did a customer training this
morning and it's one of thethings we talked about very,
very specifically, yeah, yeah,so I literally just did a
customer training this morningand it's one of the things we
talked about very, veryspecifically.
So I kind of I'll go back anddo a little.
You know we didn't do a storytime, so we'll do a little bit
of a story time here.
I think it'll fit right here asyou kind of go back into.
You know, let's do six yearsago, so 2019, we'll start with
(15:45):
that.
So 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 24,so on, so forth.
So 2019, what was it like forus?
We actually had pretty goodmoisture.
It wasn't a big drought likewe've been used to for the past
couple years.
You know, 2020, things kind ofstarted to get a little drier 21
, a little drier, 22, a littledrier and 23 really wham right
(16:06):
for a lot of dry, of dry.
And then 24, we got some decentrains.
Remember last spring itactually got pretty good rains.
Speaker 1 (16:12):
And then it turned dry again.
Speaker 3 (16:13):
And now we're back.
Now we're back to having somerains again.
So what to look forward to isyou've got to think.
Recap that you know.
I did you know I can't reallycite the source on this.
But I did see the long rangeforecast for June, july and
August, really for the entireMidwest, which was below normal
(16:35):
temps and above normal precepts,so which is weird for us.
So that's what I saw.
So that's one source.
That's why I say I don't wantto, I don't want to go into all
that, but either way you thinkabout it, you haven't had rain
for a long time.
I haven't had all this rain fora long time.
The east hasn't had this muchrain for a long time.
(16:56):
So, either way, we've gotmoisture coming in and we've got
a potentially wet June on ourhands, you know, wetter than we
have, right.
So put all that together.
What are you thinking about?
You're thinking about, you know, my seed treatments running out
of gas now, so we've had thoseon, usually get about 30 to 45
days out of those.
(17:18):
So what infections are going tostart happening?
Well, that fusarium is going tostart coming in, if it hasn't
already, and that's where SDS,you know, starts coming in, and
so that's really why we talkedabout Alevo.
There's been one big part ofthat, right.
So that's one thing to be, youknow, be cognizant of and be
alerted of that if you didn'tyou know, put some SDS you know
(17:39):
seed treatment protected on.
Or if you have a soybean variety, for example, that's not very
strong in SDS, you know, targetthose fields and watch them, you
know, especially for harvest,because they're going to be some
ones that might be prone.
You know, the next thing wetalked about this morning was
really just fungicides, right.
(18:00):
So we're starting to thinkabout okay, as crops we're at,
you know we'll come back to theweeds and the post herbicide and
all that stuff, but thinkforward to the end of the month
and you know, into uh, all july,there, you know where do we
need to start thinking about funbesides man.
What's our timing right?
So if we think about I like totalk about white mold being an
odd year pest, 2019, 21, 23 andnow 25 that's when we've had our
(18:27):
white mold pressure.
And yeah you're most likelygoing back on those fields where
you have that high pressure too.
So definitely keep those inmind and be watching those.
You know we do have someproducts Endura, we're going to
be talking about it, endura Prothis year is a possible trial
use.
So definitely reach out to BASFfor rep, try and get some of
(18:49):
that.
Basically it's a two compound,two AI product.
And then we're going to nextyear, 2026, we'll be talking
about Zarina, our new white moldfungicide.
So definitely some things thatare coming in the pipeline that
we want to be talking about andthinking about.
Of course you know our Revitecor our Veltema, you know for the
R3 application, then of corn,of course you know VT
(19:12):
application with that, but lotsof moisture, lots of humidity,
more humidity than what we'vehad in a long time, and I assume
you've got that as well, jeff.
Speaker 2 (19:19):
So I think we're yeah , we don't get humidity out.
Speaker 3 (19:22):
Yeah, we're set up for that.
So I think a lot of things froma fungicide perspective is what
I really wanted to talk abouttoday was, I think those are the
things to think about goingforward just because of, you
know, tar spots coming in onyour eastern side.
We got a lot of tar spot herein Iowa and tar spots you know
throughout the rest of the CornBelt, so definitely something to
keep our eye on.
(19:42):
You know frog eye leaf spot onsoybeans.
You know you get into northerncorn leaf light.
Based on the corn You've got agreat leaf spot We've got to
keep our eye on.
All these types of funguses aregoing to be more prevalent if
we have to moisture.
Basically, we've got thatdisease triangle.
(20:02):
We've talked about the yieldtriangle, but we've got the host
pathogen in the environment.
Now We've got those ready torock and roll.
That's the big thing we talkedabout today.
Speaker 2 (20:12):
But how about you?
Speaker 3 (20:13):
What about herbicides ?
What do you see in there?
What about weed size?
What do you think?
Speaker 2 (20:15):
Yeah, you know just to follow back on a little bit
with that.
I agree with you on the suddendeath and the white mold.
You know, if you think about it, when do you usually get that
Fusarium gets in those roots?
It's early in the soybeans.
Everybody ties in sudden deathwith.
You know that end part of Julyinto the first part of August
and it really is infecting kindof that V2 stage right, v1, v2
(20:39):
in the beans gets going early,right.
Well, you think about earlybeans we had planted this year
and how we were able to getstuff in early.
What kind of weather did wehave at V1, v2 in our soybeans?
Wet and cool, right.
What's ideal for fusariumcoming to bean roots, right?
So that's something I thinkthey really keep an eye out on
for and we'll know in a couplemonths.
And then the white mold, theopportunity for white mold to
(21:02):
come in this year.
And again, like you said,endura, and you know we always
talk like R1, right, firstflower spray, summer solstice,
you know 21st of June, but youknow, in reality I like that If
you're going to go aftersomething with Endura for a
white mold product, you know,once you hit that first flower,
wait a week to 10 days beforeyou spray, let's get all those
(21:23):
flowers, because white moldcomes in through the dead
flowers and if there's just oneflower coming out and we're
spraying, we've got all theseother ones that still need to
come out.
So you know what's that first.
You know basically that firstof July timeframe, but if it's
flowering the 21st of June kindof time from there.
Herbicides I touched on them alittle bit earlier but again, if
you were able to get moistureout there whether man-made or
(21:44):
whether through Mother Nature,on your herbicide program out
there on some of these pre's itworked really well.
Do have some fields out therethat had a pre put on and sat
there three weeks without anymoisture on it, and you know the
reality of it is just didn'tget a lot of it activated from
that standpoint of it is justdidn't get a lot of it activated
(22:05):
from that standpoint.
So there's a few fields therethat aren't as happy with what
we had, but it wasn't due toapplicator error or any, or
farmer error, it was we justcouldn't get water to it,
moisture on to help activate it,and we had 90 degree
temperatures too at those timestoo.
So right, that's the old, but ifyou think about it, a lot of
the pre's are running out rightnow a lot of the pre's that we
put down, unless it's lateplanted field, late sprayed,
they're running out right now.
(22:25):
You figure once you spray yougot about 30-35 days and you
might be getting back in thatfield but down that next layer
of the pre.
So really this week, uh, we give, we had some, we're having some
rain, but once it dries out,I've been telling the producers
you know, get in there, get thatsecond shot going in.
They're going in with a shot ofliberty ultra out there or some
other, uh, liberty 280,whatever they're using.
(22:45):
And then I'm telling them, puta good residual in there and
making sure we're putting theright things in in that field,
right, because we need to getthat later out there.
For some reason, someindividuals think that they
don't want to spend the money ortake the time to spray when
there's no weeds out there andthey want to wait till weeds are
there.
That's when they're hardest tokill.
They're easiest to kill whenthey're not there and you're
putting a layer of residual outthere.
(23:06):
So again, that's something tobe thinking about.
A lot of posting on corn isgoing to be going on here once
it's dry enough to get in there.
A lot of the corn has hit thatv5 stage, um, and it's in it's
and it's ready just to boltright, right, ready side
dressing.
That's going to be going on.
One thing to keep in mind I'vealready started to see it in a
couple fields Once we warm up,we've got the moisture, the corn
(23:29):
is at that V5 when it's readyto roll.
There's a lot of potential forrapid growth seen in corn and if
you're using a dicamba productthat isn't as safe on the corn
as like a status, you might tiethat thing up pretty tight, wrap
it up pretty tight, um, andyou're going to just be clear
status is, status is safe.
Speaker 3 (23:49):
To be clear on status is safe, exactly, status is
safe but if.
Speaker 2 (23:54):
But if you haven't, you might have feel that there's
nothing's been sprayed on.
It looks like it's been sprayedwith the growth regulator and
tied up.
That's going to be a rapidgrowth syndrome.
It'll usually out of that.
But you want that heat and alittle bit of wind to help break
those leaves.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Apart from that standpoint, so I think that's
something here.
So every single field I droveby this morning we got rapid
growth going on right now.
Speaker 2 (24:11):
You can see it and then you'll really know when you
had it here after it has rapidgrowth.
And give it a couple weekslater and all of a sudden you'll
yellow spots out on the fieldbecause it's the leaves of
unfertile and they haven't hadthe chlorophyll.
Um, every year I get a call onit.
You know my corn's dying,what's going on, let's give a
little time, it'll be okay.
But I think, from a chemistrystandpoint, yeah, now it's time
to be getting those postapplications into those corn.
(24:33):
Get down another residual inthat corn and your post
application, whether it's fiveounces of status or whatever
you're using, if you're usingsome glyphosate out there for
grasses really that's our bestthing make sure we have our
additives.
And then in the beans right nowit's probably time to you know.
If you planted that last weekof April, first week of May,
it's time to be spraying thatsecond layer of residual out
(24:53):
there and coming in with thatpost application out there and
keeping them clean is how youmaximize yield control or how
you maximize weed control.
So that's just some of thethings I'm thinking.
Now one other thing, a tiedthing I'd throw in, is have you
been noticing any white stuffflying around your area in the
last week?
A little cotton from thecottonwood trees.
Absolutely what's always the onerule of thumb Bill in this
(25:16):
industry.
We've been around here for afew years.
When you start seeing thecotton flying, what's that kind
of tell you to get patching?
Speaker 3 (25:22):
well you know um, I also ironically seen a few uh
fireflies going too so so alsohave that a little earlier than
normal, right, when you put allthat stuff together, you start
getting some corn root wormsstarting to hatch absolutely.
We are also starting to see alittle bit of soybean test
nematode starting to pop up aswell, so it.
(25:43):
It's time to start looking forthose, so yeah, they all kind of
tie together.
Speaker 2 (25:47):
You see the cotton flying, see the lightning bugs.
That's the same GDUs forhatching of the corn root worm.
Already you start seeing somecyst nematode coming out.
So those are other things too.
If you've got corn out thereand it's been a corn on corn I
know there's some individualsyou know we talked this winter
there's some individuals outthere might be going on their
third year corn on corn.
Second year I'm not too worried, but third year corn on corn.
(26:08):
If you don't have a tradedproduct or have something out
there for corn rootworm, youcould have some corn rootworm
potential.
So that would be something tokeep an eye on from that
standpoint.
Speaker 3 (26:18):
Middle of June is a good time to see what's going on
.
Yeah, earlier than I thinkwe've seen in a long time.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
Because it's usually cotton swine in the middle of
June.
Speaker 3 (26:26):
Right, right, exactly , exactly.
And then you know, we just gotan alert the other day for you
and I a very unique pest for us,soybean gall midge, basically
the first soybean gall midge,which again is a midge, small
little fly that basicallyattacks the base of the soybeans
and lays your larvae in thereand basically just eats her out
of the base of the stem andkills the plant.
(26:46):
From that perspective, andfirst emergence was a little
earlier as well, from that too.
So definitely with the heat,the heat units, the moisture,
kind of where we're at, we're ona tick ahead of where we
normally are.
And there's some things to kindof keep in mind.
So yeah, definitely, I'd say,within the next week or two, if
you're looking for soybean cystnematode, you should be able to
(27:08):
see the bright white female Hercyst, basically her egg sac
basically exploded through theroot on that small root.
So be digging some soybeanplants out there, start to look,
identify if you have somesoybean cyst nematode out there.
And yeah, you had mentioned,you know, r1.
No question about that, r1, r2.
Definitely get there for thatwhite mold.
Speaker 2 (27:31):
That's a big piece of that puzzle.
Question on those cystnematodes Pull the plants or dig
the plants.
Speaker 3 (27:43):
Oh no, dig wide and get the big old, you know, six,
eight inches out around thatplant.
Get as much of that and be ascareful as you can, because
they're going to be on those,not on the main roots, they're
going to be on the other finerroots.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
And if you pull them out, you're just going to pull
them off.
Speaker 3 (27:52):
Yeah you're not going to see them If you go out there
and pull them out and try anddig really close, you're not
even going to find any.
You'll be like I don't find any.
I didn't see any.
So, um, you know.
And then you know it's probablya tick late to do some soil
tests, so I'd wait on that untiltill the end here.
Um, you know and see, kind ofsee where we're at.
When I say the end, I'm talkinginto september, october,
(28:12):
somewhere in there.
Start pulling an r8 now, so Iwouldn't mess around with
anything now.
But but um, you know, I did.
I did personally have to pullsome samples last week and I
couldn't get into that fieldEvery time I was there.
It was too wet and I did pullsome.
So yeah, just got the resultsback.
It was a little higher than Ithought too, which was kind of
to be expected.
Fairly sandy soil at that piecein the Des Moines Lobe All
(28:34):
right.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
So you know we've been rambling here for about a
half an hour talking back andforth and probably better be
closing this one up for some ofour listeners.
But so you know what are?
Just a couple of the mainthings, main focus points we
need to be looking at here inthe next couple of two, three
weeks, as we're, as we're goingforward.
Speaker 3 (28:54):
If you tell producers where to be focused at.
Yeah, yeah, so, first andforemost, what I'm telling
everybody is is take the time togo take your stand counts.
Now you've got a good time togo walk through those corn and
bean fields, see how you'reevaluating your plan, evaluate
what you see, you know, figureout what worked, what didn't
work, Make sure you understandwhat you have for a seeding
population, what you're actuallygrew, and just kind of get a
(29:17):
good idea.
Get out there and scout thosefields and understand what your
stand is.
It's a really good time to takethose stand counts and just say
, yep, I planted X and I've gotthis, and then that was what I
expected.
So, or I've got a problem, youknow, and I've identified that
and I can make my fixes towhatever basically, whether
that's your planter or a setup,or if you had some problems
(29:39):
getting through the trash withyour row cleaners or whatever it
may be closing wheels orwhatever you had.
Basically do some time just toreally evaluate your seeding
rate, your stand kind of.
Get that stand evaluation,Check that off your list.
That's first and foremost to me.
Take the time to go do that andthen just really evaluate.
Next one would be weed control.
While you're out there walkingthrough your fields, spend some
(30:01):
time out there to say, yeah, itlooks like this is working.
If you've got a retailerspraying for you, make sure
they're trying to get there ontime, because they've got a lot
of acres to cover too.
Especially when you get somewet acres or wet times, they're
going to have a tough timegetting there on time and rates
are going to get increased.
We have to adjust that and thenstart scouting for disease.
We'll take us to our nextepisode.
(30:23):
When we get to that, we'll betalking a lot more about disease
, I think, at that point in timewhen we get there.
So that'd be kind of the mainthings I'm looking at.
Jeff, how about yourself?
Speaker 2 (30:32):
Yeah, no, absolutely, you're spot on on everything.
And then I would add on top ofthat, that's what we're going to
be doing a lot of here in thenext few weeks.
We're doing a lot of our standcounts.
Right now we're doing, look,we're looking a lot of things,
seeing how they come up.
You know, we're working withsome new experimentals.
We're looking at that.
In fact, we we've alreadytalked here yesterday, I believe
it was about we've noticed oneproduct.
(30:52):
We're looking in the field.
We're like, hey, stands are offon that one, you can tell.
And that's, that's huge for us,because we know.
You know, if something is notdoing as well as we thought it
would, or we have somethinggoing on, we'll be like well,
you know that one was off like30 percent in a lot of the plots
and stuff like that.
So, again, it helps us tounderstand what happened or
maybe give us an idea somewhatof what happened from there.
(31:14):
But again, yeah, we're in thenext two weeks it's going to be
all about weed control, gettingthings out there, and the one
thing I would say is, if you goout to your field and it's clean
, but it's been a month sinceyou sprayed, I don't want you
out there going.
Oh hey, let's wait another 10,14 days and see where it goes,
because I promise you, when itwarms up with this moisture,
(31:35):
you'll go out there 10 days fromnow and be like, oh crap.
Speaker 3 (31:39):
Where did all this come?
Speaker 2 (31:41):
from and it's a foot tall because that water hit real
fast.
So again, the best weeds tokill are the ones that aren't
there and you can layer it outfrom there.
And then again we'll be gettinginto that fungicide talk here
towards the end of the month.
But again, you know, we'regoing to hopefully have somebody
coming in another individualover our team when we do the
next podcast.
Don't know what it is.
Well, maybe we'll talk aboutfungicides, maybe we'll talk
(32:03):
about this, maybe we'll talkabout diseases we don't know.
But uh, so you're just notlistening to me and bill ramble
back and forth, we'll get yousome real experts out there to
go over the information.
But with that being said bill, Ithink we're gonna wrap it up
for the day and again.
It was great to see you againyeah yeah, five weeks, and we'll
be seeing you here off and onagain.
But with that being said, we'dlike to say thank you for
(32:24):
joining us today on this episodeof Spilling the Beans.
We invite you to download theGrow Smart Life app for
resources and share this podcastwith other growers.
So, from myself and from Bill,keep staying safe and make it a
great day.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Thanks for joining us on Spilling the Beans, where
every episode gets you one stepcloser to maximizing your
soybean profitability.
If you found today's insightsvaluable, subscribe and leave us
a review on your favoriteplatform.
Download the Grow Smart Liveapp for more resources and share
the podcast with other growers.
See you next week with moreexpert tips to help you grow
(33:36):
smarter and achieve the bestyields yet.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Transcription by CastingWords not imply any
affiliation with or endorsementby its owner.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
Always read and follow label directions Before
mixing components.
Always conduct a compatibilityjar test.
Always consult respectiveproduct labels for specific
mixing instructions.
The most restrictive labelapplies.
Natsai Fastax CS is arestricted use pesticide.
Nemasphere, zorina and Voraxorare not registered and not
available for sale.
This information is providedfor educational purposes only
and is not intended to promotethe sale of this product.
Any sale of this product afterregistration is obtained shall
(34:02):
be based solely on theEPA-approved product label and
any claims regarding productsafety and efficacy shall be
addressed solely by the label.
The views expressed by BASFemployees and guests are their
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Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.