The 2020 season was the first time in Mattoon, Ill., farmer Andy Dole’s career where he and his father pushed soybean planting ahead of corn in April. Dole says soil temperatures weren’t high enough in April to plant corn, but that seed treatments on soybeans made planting that crop more feasible.
Dole says planting soybeans early has paid off in higher yield.
“Even a seemingly small increase, like one pod per plant, can actually result in massive yield increases across the field,” he says. “Our soybean potential was very high until we suffered floods and then a late-season drought.”
Related: Wet fields even wetter in 2019, 2020
Paul Yoder, Dole’s Pioneer agronomist, says 76% of the time, across all Pioneer’s yield trials since 2013, soybeans that yield 85 to 100-plus bushels per acre were planted between April 16 and April 30.
“You start flowering early,” Yoder says. “Soybeans will abort 75% of their flowers every year. However, if they begin earlier [prior to summer solstice June 20] with the April plant, soybeans will gain around 15 more days of flowering over May plants. Most soybeans have 17 nodes per plant. If you can gain one additional three-bean pod, you will gain an extra 35-plus bushels per acre.”
Knowing this, Dole aims to plant all his soybeans during that early window, just like they were able to do in 2020. Dole says they had a “phenomenal” planting season in 2020, with most of their crop planted within 10 days.
Related: 5 yield lessons from 2020
“Soybeans planted toward the end of May were about 15 bushels off of our average,” Dole says of 2020 results, but cautions that could be due to other differences in management, like fungicide.
Dole says that because planting soybeans early has a clear return on investment, it’s worth it to have two planters: one dedicated for soybeans and the other for corn. However, he’s unsure if new equipment has a clear ROI. He says most of the farm’s equipment came into service after 2012, and “they’re barely getting broke in at this point.”
“John Deere’s ExactEmerge planter was the last implement we purchased that offered some added benefit, but genetics and conditions are the two driving factors in yield,” Dole says, adding he doesn’t see a need to reinvest in newer equipment because it doesn’t drive yield.
Pioneer agronomist Matt Montgomery says because of cool and wet conditions, planting soybeans earlier into March didn’t offer a yield benefit compared to April-planted beans in 2020.
“It just sat there,” Montgomery says. A good seed treatment, however, protected seed that was sitting in the ground awaiting warmer temperatures. “That’s the key to making early-planted soybeans work.”
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