Mid-Season Soil Sampling For Micronutrients In Corn Fields

“We’ve seen lots and lots of problems across the state, particularly with nutrients. Magnesium, sulfur, most of these   mobile nutrients that we have are clearly moved down in the profile, and then you’ve got this corn in cool conditions growing very slowly, root systems fairly shallow with these saturated soils, and as result we’re seeing lots of corn looking pretty yellow, and in some cases necrotic lower leaves, and in some cases purplish mid rib, typical for cool conditions at night.”

 

So, have those micronutrients leached out of the soil altogether, or are they simply out of reach?  Heiniger had these thoughts:

 

“Well, I do think we’re seeing some leaching on some of these.  Id’ say in the last four years or so, I’ve seen more and more magnesium deficiencies across the state.  It’s not unusual to see them on sandy soils, but I’ve seen it on many different cases, even on some more heavier, more sandy-loam soils.  I think with all the rain that we’ve had over the last year, that some of these more soluble elements like magnesium, have leached down, perhaps not out of the system, but certainly lower than what our root systems are exploring right now.”

 

Sulfur deficiency is also evident says Heiniger:

 

“Same thing can be said about sulfur, I’ve seen several cases where the sulfur index taken on soil samples in the fall wasn’t too bad, but it’s very clear that we’re seeing almost severe sulfur deficiency on those same soils this spring.  So, what that means to me is that sulfur has moved down with all this rain we’ve had, we’ve had gee…almost 80 inches of rain in the last three months over the winter.  So, it’s clear to me that some of these mobile elements have leached down.  I do think sulfur…it does bind where it gets into a clay layer…I think the sulfur is still there, it;s just getting roots down into it.”