By Seth Naeve And Jeff Coulter et.al
What a year. After an extended period of wet weather, farmers are finally being able to get out into the fields to harvest corn and soybeans across the state.In many areas, crops reached physiological maturity, but field conditions and persistent rains kept combines out of the field. As fields dry out and farmers get back into the field, reports of grain quality concerns have arisen.
Soybean Concerns
Unfortunately, the perfect storm for seed quality issues starts with dry summer conditions followed by chronic rainfall during late seed-fill and early maturity. This scenario is very common in the southern Delta states, where summers can be hot and dry, and late season hurricanes can drop gulf moisture on the crop prior to harvest. This causes significant seed quality issues from fungal pathogens and preharvest sprouting (PHS) or vivipary (today's $10 word). Fortunately, normal cool and dry conditions in northern states tend to greatly reduce these seed quality issues for Minnesota farmers. Not this year. The following two seed quality issues are being reported in southern Minnesota.
Purple seed stain (PSS) caused by infection by Cercospora spp. (discussed in a recent Science for Success posting) is a common seed quality concern that is related to rainfall in the early seed-fill phase and can lead to significant discounts at the elevator due to its obvious visual characteristic.
Source : umn.edu