By Meaghan Anderson and Angie Rieck-Hinz et.al
As crops emerge, early-season scouting provides an opportunity to evaluate planting success and identify emerging disease or insect issues. Knowing how things are looking can help you make more informed management decisions. The following sections outline key considerations and tips for effective early-season scouting.
Tools
Before you head out to the field, there are several tools that are a must-have for early-season crop scouting.
- A tape measure to take stand counts. As the saying goes, “If you don’t measure it, you can’t improve it.”
- A seed digger, trowel, or spade to dig up seeds or plants to evaluate planting depth, seedling diseases and below-ground feeding insects, like seed corn maggots. A square-bottom spade is particularly effective. You can easily push it into the ground a few inches from the furrow, pop open the furrow, and expose the furrow wall and evaluate planting depth, seed placement, sidewall compaction, and early rooting issues.
For a more thorough list of tools and resources for crop scouting, see the encyclopedia article “Crop Scouting Basics”.
Crop Growth Stage
Any time we are out scouting in a field, take time to note what growth stage the crop is at. Besides understanding what is happening to the crop at that growth stage, knowing the stage can also be critical for things like pesticide applications. For example, some herbicide labels restrict applications based on crop stage. Additionally, decisions of side-dressing fertilizers may also be impacted by the growth stage of the crop.
The Corn Growth Stages and Soybean Growth Stages articles are great refreshers on what to look for when identifying those stages.
Source : iastate.edu