Farming

Matt Miles, Chad Henderson and Kevin Matthews pay a visit to Lee Lubbers farm in Gregory, South Dakota to take a look at his dry land corn and talk about field management practices, soil, product trials, and a whole lot more. The next best thing to being in the field with these 4 top growers is watching it on video.

In the old days if you wanted a bumper crop of corn, you sprayed copious amounts of Atrazine and put down a lot of nitrogen. While some farmers may think that’s still the game plan, Kevin Matthews attains record yielding corn with a different approach — he maximizes micronutrients with a big assist from the folks at Agroliquid. That company has multiple product corn fertility trials in place on Kevin’s North Carolina farm where he has 135 acres devoted to experimentation. Galynn Beer and Stephanie Zelinko from Agroliquid join Kevin to explain nutrient management and how to get huge bushels with efficient nutrient utilization.

The wedding is over and now Kevin hopes the honeymoon phase begins as he cuts his NCGA contest corn. He breaks down what he likes about it and the field management practices that he used to get it to this point. Corn is in the hopper and it's safe to say based on the yield monitor that the "Wedding Corn" has done its job.

In a previous episode we explained Plant Growth Regulators (PGR’s). In this episode, Peter Rousenelos and Gunther Kreps of AgXplore join Iowa farmer Kelly Garrett to further explain the mode of action and benefits of using PGR’s on your farm. The big benefit of course is yield — which equals dollars. Even if you’re already familiar with PGR’s, give this a listen as the AgXplore team discusses trials — there’s a reason the company has seen a 3.5 times increase in acres treated! Kelly’s experience with application methods and timing offer practical lessons you can use.

Lee Lubbers takes you into some of his better corn ground to talk about what he looks for when he takes corn grown on ground with a high base saturation of K into wheat or beans the following season.

In most of the corn and soybean growing regions, we envision center pivots when we think of irrigation. But in an Ag world impacted increasingly by environmental forces compelling us to till less and drastically reduce resource consumption, we may utilize more drip irrigation. Dan Luepkes explains the Netafim drip irrigation system he uses to set yield records on his Illinois farm. You’ll see command central, the distribution infrastructure, and head in field to see the results.

Plant Growth Regulators (PGR’s) have been available since 1979 according to Mark Coots, founder and CEO of Teva Corporation. That’s news to a lot of farmers who are still unfamiliar with the products 42 years after their alleged introduction. Mr. Coots and his plant biologist son, Caleb, join Kelly Garrett to explain PGR technology and the results farmers can attain when PGR’s are used in conjunction with other best farming practices.

Soil is the most important resource in production agriculture. How you manage it determines your farm’s long term success. Robb Dedman of Ultimate Ag Consulting joins Matt Miles of Miles Farms to discuss their 21st century approach to monitoring, measuring, and managing their farm’s precious soil resource.

This is Kelly's first year planting Integra corn seed. He takes a look at Integra 6061's ear placement, viability and plant health at various points in his field.