Soybeans Today January 2001

Droughts, ins heavy toll on crop

by Rich Maples

Arkansas' 2000 soybean crop got off to a good start. Then the rains stopped, the temperature rose and insects moved in.

"We had wonderful June rains, almost too much rain in some areas," says University of Arkansas Soybean Agronomist Lanny Ashlock. "The rain carried the crop into August, even though we had a dry July. I thought there was a possibility we would have a 30-bushel crop.

"Then August arrived."

Weeks without water and day after day of temperatures above 100 took their toll. Fields that couldn't be irrigated suffered severe yield losses, says Ashlock.

"It's bad when you have low yields, and it's bad when you have low prices. When you have both, it's disastrous. And that's the situation we had in the Mid-South. Prices were low in the Midwest, too, but farmers were able to compensate somewhat with bumper crops."

Ashlock says insects made the situation worse for Arkansas farmers. "We started out with army worms and corn ear worms pretty much statewide. We had outbreaks of soybean loopers in southeast Arkansas and up into the Arkansas River Valley. Stinkbugs were bad, especially in southwest Arkansas.

"Some drought-stressed fields had to be treated for grasshoppers. We saw three-cornered alfalfa hoppers and, in September, we became aware of the dectes stem borer. What we thought was disease pressure in some fields turned out to be these stem borers. They were especially damaging in fields that hadn't been in a good crop rotation program."

Not everything was bad in 2000. Disease pressure was low, and farmers who were able to irrigate at the right time were rewarded with good yields.

"Yield monitors recorded yields in the 80-bushel range, even higher, in some irrigated fields," says Ashlock. "When you see that, you know you're doing a good job.

"If you can put a high level of management to soybeans, they will respond, even if it's as hot as it was last August."

Ashlock notes that because of our soil types, pest problems and water demand, no producers work harder to make a crop than Arkansas farmers. "But to be consistent, you have to irrigate."

Ashlock says soybean producers are very interested in how late Group III and early Group IV varieties will perform in Arkansas fields. "They want varieties that can avoid drought, and they want soybean production systems and varieties that require less watering, especially in the Grand Prairie."

"In recent years, the best dryland beans have usually been the early planted, early maturing varieties. When conditions are good, they usually don't do as well as the later maturing varieties. But we're identifying some high-yielding Group IIIs in the University of Arkansas' variety performance tests."

Ashlock says soybean farmers are looking for ways to improve their double cropping systems. "Roundup Ready varieties have certainly helped."

He says about 80 percent of the soybean seeds sold in Arkansas in 2000 were Roundup Ready. "That doesn't mean 80 percent of acreage was Roundup Ready, because a lot of farmers kept conventional seed from the previous crop."

Looking back, 2000 was a tough year for soybean farmers. But hope springs eternal for the upcoming year.

Soybeans Today January 2001
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