September 11 2008

September 11, 2008

Greeting,

I am happy to say that we are back online once again! After a bad experience of ordering software online, (even though we did get a refund), we have web publishing ability again.

The moisture finally ran out on the farm. We had got just enough 1/4 inch rains to keep the crop growing but labor day weekend just sucked the life out of the corn and beans. I had been gone the previous week and upon returning it looked like I had been gone a month. As you can see in the photos most of the leaves are off the beans and the corn does not have a lot of green left. It will be interesting to see what the yields are. The longer day corn appears to be hurt worse than the shorted day. It looks as if the shorter day corn was just farther along when the moisture ran out. Where I live, rain has been timely and even on high dry sand the corn is still green, but it needs time to mature. I am not sure what would fare better, corn the dried out and matured or corn that freezes early. I expect a lot of variability on the plots. I have 4 plots that were planted into undisturbed wheat stubble that appear greener than the rest. How ever they are farther behind. It is easy to see where the best soil is as well. I really don't think is payed to spray for the soybean aphid as the leave fell off rather quickly. We have had nice rains since labor day, that will probably still help. The alfalfa seeded the first week in August is coming but not like the previous 2 years. These last rains may help. We have cover crops planted this fall. The concorde shank drill got a much better catch. The switch grass did not appear to thicken up. There was a heavy amount of dandelions that came which we sprayed late in July with Widematch. It just does not look like a high amount of biomass at this point, but we will still keep working with it.

If you would like to visit the farm, just give us a call. We have a lot of things to look at and or board member can supply you with a wealth of knowledge.

Have a good week.

Kelly Cooper- farm manager