It’s May 30, it’s topping 80 degrees and it feels like mid-summer. First cutting is underway with a vengeance. Clear alfalfa is close or exceeds three feet if it hasn’t lodged and just showing early buds. It’s just about right on schedule considering the late start to spring. Grasses were on target with a mid-May harvest timing. Our measurements recorded 14 inch alfalfa on May 15. We sent three samples (fresh, unfermented) for forage analysis to verify our predictions (Table 1).
We started our measurements about a week later this year compared to 2017 but the crop caught up and is maturing on schedule. Topdressing with fertilizer or manure immediately after harvest will boost 2nd cutting yields. Earlier in May hay crop yields looked like they would be lower than normal but rain in the last two weeks of May and some warm weather have really supported growth.
Retrospective of Crop Season
A February warm up incited spring fever but conditions soon turned back to winter which hung on through April with snowfall each week and squall like storms late into the month. The late start to spring caused some logjams particularly with manure spreading and planting. Cold soil temperatures caused some consideration for delaying planting but calendar date overruled and planting began as soon as soil conditions permitted in early May. Plantings of oats, other spring grains, new seedings and corn were going into the ground in early May.
Surprisingly once spring’s work got started, it progressed pretty smoothly. Heavy damaging thunderstorms have been limited, which is a huge relief since our soil is highly susceptible to erosion so close to tillage. At this time applied nitrogen and that mineralizing from manure should be intact since there hasn’t been rain enough to leach it out of the soil.
There have been few reports of early season pests. I’ve seen only light alfalfa weevil feeding this year and have not heard reports of cut worm yet. Elson Shields, our NY State Extension entomologist, tweeted that the first potato leaf hoppers have arrived near Kinderhook, NY.
The earliest emerged corn that I saw was on May 9 in the town of Ithaca. One week later corn was popping up all over. Emerged corn looks great! Soybeans are cracking.
Next Task: Weed Control
Post-emergence herbicide applications are recommended at 5” tall or ‘soda can’ height. The weeds are cooperating by emerging and growing right now. I highly encourage the addition of a residual herbicide or two with glyphosate treatments to protect the crop from a later emerging flush of weeds. Annual grasses and some of the large seeded broadleaf annuals like velvetleaf and ragweed will emerge throughout the summer especially if the crop canopy is slow to close.
Resolve Q® and atrazine are a standard combination of residual herbicides. A half rate of a pre-emergent grass herbicides like s-metolachlor, pendamethalin or Outlook®. If you are spraying without a license you are limited to non-restricted herbicides such as pendamethalin and Resolve Q. Halex® is preloaded with residual herbicides for annual broadleaves and grasses. You can mix a homemade version with glyphosate and the ingredients in Lumax® (s-metolachlor, Calisto® (mesotrione) and atrazine) or Acuron® which has the same ingredients as Lumax® with the addition of bicyclopyrone.
To avoid hedging your bets and waiting until the tougher-to-control perennial weeds like horsenettle, bind weed and milkweed are large enough to treat, while letting the weeds that are present now continue to grow and penalize yield, it is recommended to control that early flush of weeds and plan for a second application to target the perennial weeds. Often the addition of a dicamba salt speeds burndown and assists control. Permit® is the post emergence herbicide of choice for nutgrass control although it works best with smaller nutsedge. Yukon is a pre-mix of Permit® and dicamba giving a double whammy to troublesome broadleaf annuals.