Moisture Needed For Soybean Crop

Rain would definitely be a welcome site for farmers this weekend.

Jeff Hamre of Legend Seed made the trip to Manitoba this past week from just outside of Fargo. He says things are looking pretty dry across the entire region.

"From southern Minnesota, or even northern Iowa, all the way up into Saskatchewan where we were last week, it looks very good," he said. "Everybody's dry. There's little pockets that have had a few little rains that have helped but even here in the Winkler area we've got a beautiful looking soybean crop coming, and corn crop, but if we could get an inch or two of rain this weekend, they might have to buy a new truck to get it to market."

Over 100 people attended a Legend Seed soybean and corn plot tour on Thursday between Winkler and Morden. Hamre was onsite discussing some of the mistakes they've made over the years growing soybeans.

"Our biggest mistake that we made when we were first starting with soybeans was fertilization," he commented. "Soybeans is a very unique plant. It manufactures its own nitrogen and it has to use its own nitrogen to make the peas in the pod or the soybeans themselves."

He notes lowering the nitrogen level and increasing the bacteria count in the soil produced a major yield increase.

Hamre said this year's crop is still about a month away from harvest, and he is hoping we don't see an earlier frost heading into September.

Source: SteinbachOnline