2 Ear or Not 2 Ear?
What's the deal with the second ear? Do you want a second ear? It is another ear of corn after all that contributes to yield, right? Or is it a bad thing that takes nutrients away from the primary ear? So is a second ear a good thing or a bad thing? We pose the question: 2 Ear or Not 2 Ear? Let's see what our 2 experts from AgXplore have to say about it.
00:00 The second ear is it good or is it bad? You know what maybe you already have your opinion? Maybe you have what you think to be factual but we're gonna dig into right here 00:09 at extreme Ag and I've got two experts. In fact, these guys are corn guys. One of them has a PHD in all this kind of stuff. His name 00:15 is Brian Adams. His name is Calvin Murphy with ag Explorer. We're standing outside of a corn field that is a contest 00:21 field for Chad Henderson. And one thing I noticed along the edge second years that happens sometimes but I said, hey Brian, I got told my whole life growing up on a farm in 00:30 Indiana. You don't really want that second year because it's stealing the energy in the nutrients from what would have been one really good year 00:36 and you said not so fast Damian so you guys take it away. So so the point of that yes, we're on in the end, right? And that's where the most common place 00:45 you'll see second years are a lot of really high yield corn Farmers. Yeah, like you see an extreme egg the way they manage you're 00:51 gonna see them on further out into the field. You know, it's not something. I don't think you'll ever see it 100% right, you know, maybe when you start getting up world 01:00 Level, I don't know. I've never seen corny of that high, but I've seen a lot of good 300 plus bushel corn a lot of second ears. 01:06 They're not always fully formed like the first year and conventional wisdom. Yes is all you know the old school wisdom. I heard it a long time growing up that that second year 01:15 and all you don't want that. It is robbing from the first and as you grow and you learn more and you see more as a scientist, 01:21 you better have an open mind, you're not I mean a job very long I think to me a second year and sometimes you can 01:28 see a third one a second one coming out the same the primordia there with the where the 01:34 primary is. I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing. I think Calvin feel free to jump in or disagree even that that is a really good index of 01:43 how healthy and how happy you're happy is up to that point. All right, so Kelly obviously we are on an edge and we know we're gonna see that more and as a function of daylight and there's no population of 01:52 corn grows right next to us next to us, right, correct, but the whole thing, it's still an energy from that plant. That should have gone. 02:00 First year I got told that for years. I mean it was probably a time in the old days. They wanted the second year and then they said no not in modern 02:06 days, which had been the 80s or something seventies. No, and now we're back to Second ears were okay help me out. So that plant when 02:12 you start seeing this technically, it is a portion of the sunlight especially here on that side row, but when you see it on in the field, it normally means that plant's very happy. It's it's has nutrients. 02:21 It's it's luxury feeding it thinks it can potentially feeding, you know luxury feeding. All right, it's gonna try to but like it 02:30 like at the Bellagio. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, correct Bellagio buffet versus western sizzler. So we're we're doing this and you're 02:40 saying not amen. It's not taking energy away from the primary ear. It's just throwing another year now that tells me you 02:46 need to keep feeding this plant. You want to try to maximize and let it it looks like it's been pollinated with the primary 02:52 ears it does and it you need to fade. It don't get short. Now you you're trying to make sure that like Brian said that here probably. 03:00 Won't fill out a hundred percent like the first okay. Well, it's not gonna fill it to be 100% Let's go ahead and take that I'm gonna take that and say wait 03:06 the next thing if it's not gonna fill a hundred percent. He says keep feeding it. How much do I keep feeding a run? You know what I'm a livestock guy. There's a 03:12 reason why the litter well sometimes minus demise it didn't justify being fed because it wasn't going to perform. He's saying no feed 03:18 the Run well, so he is but I would say at the same time that feeding still feeding that first year primary when we're making that money at work anything from here. 03:28 Is what you're targeting right down here everything there you get is a bonus is the way I look at it. Now. You don't want to spend $100 to get a twenty dollar 03:37 bonus route. We all know that there's a definitive line in there. I would be scared to step out and and try to put any number on I think it would definitely be a case-by-case filled 03:46 by field scenario. That's was how much of how much you feed it, but you know, I mean you think of 03:52 the things you know that go into Greenfield nitrogen phosphorus potassium sulfur 03:57 Name any nutrient right and that doesn't necessarily mean come out here and throw the world at it. But especially in terms of like a contest guy or somebody like Chad standing in 04:06 his contest field here looking at this corn Chad's going with a little more money. Yeah, right because his ultimate goal here 04:12 is to ring the bell. Okay, but you know what people listen this aren't trying to ring the bell in a contest. They don't need a plaque that says that they won. They 04:18 just want to be profitable and they want to get another $20 of rep net revenue out of an acre of field is the second 04:24 year going to be something that they chase if it's harvestable I think so when you think Brian you want it 04:30 harvestable where that combine. Okay, and I don't think you make any A decision to you get right here where we are now that Captain so 04:36 we haven't cut that open but looking at those silks the texture of them the color of them and have short they are yeah and the 04:42 fact they're short, right? They haven't been growing way out chasing pollen because everything was out of sink. It looks like when they get 04:48 too long of silks like they're hanging down like some sort of a out of control palm tree or something you're saying that's a problem because 04:54 you missed the knee. So you miss the nickname the shake of the pollen. Yeah, that's right and having that match that with it, so Now you come in here and you look you would take this 05:03 you would take this ear pull it off, maybe and Gage and say yeah, this is an average repetitation of every second. You 05:09 just said a little while ago words like sigila demise of the chlorophyll and then you 05:15 just struggle with representation. You amaze me right here from west Tennessee. Can I ask you this calm because you know, you study corn. Is this 05:25 something that We Chase genetic and science chases the yield right? Well, we're gonna start breeding in and 05:35 I know a couple of companies already saying this we're gonna start seeing where they say two ears on every stock. Is that coming five years 05:41 from now, we're gonna be having seed sales reps coming in the driveway saying, you know what you got two ears. I ever stop. I think it's it's possible 05:47 in any plan. I don't know if you know it but every node on a corn plant has the potential to reproduce to 05:53 produce in here. So are the companies that make the seeds and breed for the genetics to get us our yields. Are they going to 05:59 be touted? Let me chasing this and touting it in another five years. I don't think they are right now possibly down the road. Who knows that's a very 06:05 political answer. You essentially said nothing. All right. Let's go to you really good. All right, Brian. He 06:11 didn't give me the answer I wanted because it was not a yes or no in five years or even 10 years our seed companies going to 06:17 say, you know, what we've really been pursuing this second or even third multiple ears on a stock because Calvin said 06:23 every one of these not just could be producing here. Is that something we're gonna see five. Years from now I would I'm gonna probably 06:29 Echo Calvin sentiment and say a whole lot of nothing companies are aware of it. They're already looking at it. 06:36 How much they're willing to do to drive that exploitation to the market I think is going to depend on a lot of things the 06:42 economy at the time you got to understand if you're trying to raise a second year all of a sudden and you're truly trying to double that first 06:48 year inputs are fixing to go away right that there's cost associated with everything this current time and I don't know anybody really wants 06:54 to be chasing a second either. They're just chasing a profitable crop. Now if the inputs match the return I think 07:00 you might see that a little sooner than you would rather than later. But but going back into one thing we started into earlier and kind 07:06 of got away from At the end of the day the ability for a plant to do that is based off light capture space and and its ability to to 07:13 quote unquote roam around without ever moving. It realizes it has the room to grow and the resources to access that a population. Yeah population responsive. By 07:22 the way. I just absolutely love it. He's a he's a PhD in Agronomy who uses big huge word struggles with representation and he also talks about the economics. You know, how rare it 07:31 is for an agronomic person be able to talk to economics there. I've got undergrad degree and egg. There you go. That's where it comes 07:37 from Galvin and Smith this it's a thing about population. That's why we see these two or even three ear stalks on 07:44 edge that means because there ain't no row right here or here so it has that so it's a function of population. We here at extreme AG been doing experiments Kelly Garrett 07:53 pioneering this. Well, at least leading the charge on this if you will on reducing population of planting soybeans, you know, 07:59 we used to think again to put 180,200,000 soybeans per acre. He did a try over it down to 34,000 and didn't miss the yield by much of anything. 08:07 Thing and saved a hell of a lot on safety cost. Yeah, why don't we go from what's a normal 27,000 population 08:13 of corn depending that 27? Probably more dry land for irrigated ground where I'm from in Mississippi. It's closer to 32 to 36. Okay. So maybe up 08:22 where I am is 27,000 Northeast India down here is 33. Let's just say as a good number like that. What if we went to just doing 08:28 half of that but we got the same amount of ears because every corn stock through more years. We'd save a 08:37 lot of money on Seed corn at 300 some dollars a bag. I think you'd be disappointed at the end of the year though, Brian I don't dis. 08:43 It with him. It's it's a risk you take right? I don't know that you cut it in half do I think you could cut it some? Yeah, absolutely. So ever I go from $30,000 down to 20,000. 08:54 I've had Growers go as low as 17,000 if you've got the right genetics, yeah with legs ears and the ability to 09:00 compensate or in this case the ability to throw a second here and figure out and be able to identify that hey this plant can throw that second year and get me what I 09:09 want but yes, the possibility exists. I would be more comfortable down to 24,000 person. Okay, so five years from now, we think there's gonna be a reduced population of planning on the chance that 09:18 this thing actually continues to develop secondary. Yes, okay now and you're saying very outside chance, okay, never 09:24 say that but the main thing we answered was our second year even multiple years good or bad. You're saying they're not 09:30 bad. I think they're good. All right, Damian Mason coming at you with the boys from extreme. I'm from AG Explorer Brian Adams and Calvin Murphy and we're hanging out in the 09:39 cornfield talking about the second year. Is it good or is it bad now? You got their answer which is 09:43 until next time
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