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Adding soybeans: management tips

A soybean specialist recommends a few management tips for farmers adding more soybean acres this year. Shawn Conley with the University of Wisconsin says farmers need to plant different soybean varieties than they did in 2016.

“Mostly likely you as a farmer planting a high yielding which probably had not a lot of resistant traits in it, chasing after yields. So make sure you plant a different variety that has genetic resistance to those disease problems that you have in the field if possible,” says Conley.

He tells Brownfield there is a balance between a short term investment in adding soybean acres and the long term sustainability of a farm operation.

“With 80 bushel beans, you took off 100 pounds of fertilizer equivalent K-2-O, make sure you have herbicide out there at a full rate, make sure if you had white mold you’d cut your seeding rate back so you don’t have many challenges because you’re probably going to have white mold again, and be VERY diligent in scouting those fields,” says Conley.

Conley also says disease and weed issues develop earlier in fields that are planted to soybeans multiple years in a row.

Audio: Shawn Conley, soybean specialist, University of Wisconsin