Wheat Pete's Word, Oct 20: Yellow wheat, volunteer beans, shaggy barley, and clean corn

To butcher a phrase, not all wheat that turns yellow is lost. Reports of yellow wheat in areas of Ontario has many farmers asking what they can do about it, and the answer — very little — is one of the few downers in this episode of Wheat Pete’s Word. But don’t worry! It’s not as bad as it seems.

Also in this week’s episode, host Peter Johnson offers an update on DON levels in the corn crop, discusses if clipping shaggy barley is worth it, and asks farmers to double check for harvest losses in edible bean and IP bean fields.

Have a question you’d like Johnson to address or some yield results to send in? Disagree with something he’s said? Leave him a message at 1-888-746-3311, send him a tweet (@wheatpete), or email him at [email protected]

SUMMARY

• LEADS last intake is open. More info is here.
• Diego works on 247,000 acres! Thanks for the note, Diego
• Nooooooooo Wheat Pete’s Word is spine-chilling or scary?! No!
• Yields are spectacular in corn for Ontario
• Did you catch The Agronomists on Monday, where Pete and Aaron have a friendly wager about average corn yield. Will it hit 2-0 something?
• Double crop beans show promise
• A whack of cow chow with sorghum
• Winter canola was looking good, but some is bolting. Not good. Unlike winter wheat, it does not have to vernalize
• What’s the deal with sprouted corn? Fusarium, likely
• DON levels are pretty low; it’s a clean corn crop
• There are some hot spots with 5 to 7 ppm for DON
• If you’re in a hot spot, get that corn out of the field as soon as you can
• Yield is best explained by kernel weight (NOT test weight)
• Are wheat acres done? Push that seeding rate, please
• Don’t give up on wheat! Even in to November. It’s worth putting it in the ground, so says the long-term rotation
• We need frost! Why?
• Volunteer beans are the new cover crop. Ouch. (See photo at the top of the page) 7 bu/ac loss estimated in some fields
• Get behind that combine and adjust, please
• Fall armyworm in oats and clover along north shore of Lake Erie. Frost takes care of that, too
• Lush wheat in the fall? We worry about snow mould
• Early seeded winter barley is 10 to 12 inches tall. Do you clip or cut, or leave it? The (old) research suggests no, but that was done in a non-snow mould area
• Are we past the critical harvest period on alfalfa? Yes, but you’re borrowing from the spring
• Wheat before a huge rain was a gamble that paid off, generally
• Re-seed in November if you have to, given all this rain
• What does yellow wheat need right now? Restricted root growth or root death. There’s nothing you can do. It’s about uptake not availability/rates.

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