Time to Think about White Mold
The rain and warm weather have pumped-up soybean growth. Most of the fields I looked at were full flower (R2) this week. Some canopies have already closed on the early planted narrow-row beans. If you have a history of white mold in your current soybean fields, you should be thinking about a fungicide application. I know some have already sprayed. This humid weather is conducive to white mold sporulation particularly as canopies close. Ideally, we want to get the crop sprayed just before canopy closure to be able to get the flowers on the main stem protected. After that, it is hard to get coverage where we need it.
Corn Leaf Diseases are Here!
This weather is also perfect for corn leaf diseases like Northern Corn Leaf Blight (NCLB) and Gray Leaf Spot (GLS). The first picture of NCLB was sent to me this week. See the cigar shaped legion with tapered ends. This is early for us, but everything has been early this year. Look at how much corn is tasseled and silking! Time to get out and assess whether these diseases are present. A lot of corn is at the beginning of the recommended timing for fungicide application (VT, tasseling to R2, kernel blister stage). Hopefully, you have planted hybrids with the highest level of resistance. It may also be time to start looking for tar spot particularly in those areas that we have found it before. See the Tar Spot map, https://corn.ipmpipe.org/tarspot/ to view those areas in gray. You can also see there are lots of yellow confirmed areas already including eastern Michigan, Ontario Canada and two counties in PA.
Changes to the NYC&SGA Soybean and Corn Yield Contests
The NY Corn & Soybean Growers Association has made some changes to the annual NY Yield Contests. The first is that there will only be a NY Soybean Contest. There will not be a NY Corn Contest. I would encourage those with some good-looking corn this year to enter the National Corn Contest. We have plenty of NY growers who enter each year and have even placed on the national level.
NY Soybean Contest
There will also be some changes to the soybean contest this year. There will not be entries in four maturity groups (0,1,2,3), only two groups (1 & 2). There have been very few group 0 and 3 entries and for agronomic and economic purposes, we get our best yields from group 1 and 2 soybeans. Instead of just one winner from each group, there will now be awards for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place in each group in each region. There will still be five regions (West, Finger Lakes, Central, North and East) and the same prizes for the top 3 yields in the state. To enter the Soybean Contest, go to https://nycsga.memberclicks.net/2024yieldcontest#!/. All entries will be online, and the Final Deadline is August 14.
National Corn Contest
The National Corn Contest is run by the National Corn Growers Association (NCGA). For NY growers, there are six different classes you can enter based on tillage (Conventional Non-Irrigated & Irrigated, No-till Non-Irrigated & Irrigated, Strip/Mulch/Ridge-till Non-Irrigated & Irrigated). In addition to the main contest, NCGA will put all NY state harvest results together to determine NY winners in each class. You must be a member of the NCGA to enter online at https://ncga.com/get-involved/national-corn-yield-contest. Final Entry Deadline is August 14.
Next report will be July 24.
