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Several farmers commented that no-till soybeans in corn stalks really struggled this year. Where they tilled the corn stalks, they think the soybeans are yielding better. That could be why farmers appear to be doing more tillage this year. If you attended Nutrient Management Certification, they heard that phosphorous needs to be “incorporated”. I prefer the term injected, because if you tell a farmer he needs to “incorporate” his fertilizer, most times they want to get out the plow! Unfortunately, that is the wrong message. Fertilizer needs to come in contact with the soil, and banding phosphorus fertilizer with starter fertilizer is a better management tool, then massive tillage. Aggressive tillage is going to lead to more soil erosion and increased water runoff, and unfortunately, higher soluble phosphorus in our surface water. So how should farmers deal with cold wet soils in the spring? In 2014, we had a cold winter that lingered into spring. When farmers till a soil, they dry it o...

Last week, we thought we had one new major weed in Putnam County, now we know we have three major noxious weeds: Palmer, Spiny, and Waterhemp. Steve Prochaska, Area Agronomist for OSU Extension and I found Palmer Amaranth on one farm near Continental, Spiny Amaranth on two farms in the Sugar Creek flood plains near Kalida, and Waterhemp at one site near Continental along the road and near a corn field. Even worse, upon further inspection, all the plants now have viable black seeds which are extremely small (tip of a pen). Pigweed has both male and female plants, so the plants can cross pollinate with our native pigweed and they have a lot of hybrid vigor. They are highly adaptable and can be extremely hard to control. Yield losses as high as 80-90% may be common on fields where the weeds are not controlled. Farmers should be on the lookout for strange patches of weeds or even single weeds. Contact the Putnam County Extension office if you have a strange weed you want identified at 419-...

Culman, Dayton, King, and Labarge, Ohio State University specialists (CORN Newsletter, 2014- 28) say “Current Ohio field research to minimize phosphorus losses at the edge of the field should start with the following recommendations to maximize productivity while minimizing environmental impacts on water quality. Avoid overloading soils. Soil test and follow tri-state fertilizer recommendations. Where soil test levels are above 40 ppm Bray P1 or 58 ppm Mehlich III-ICP, do not apply additional phosphorus in the corn-soybean rotation. These soil test levels require no additional fertilizer, according to the Tri-State Fertilizer recommendations. Fertilizing soils testing above these levels increases risk of P in runoff and tile drainage. Avoid winter application. Eliminate surface application of manure or fertilizer to frozen or snow-covered fields. Frozen ground is ground that is frozen to the degree that tillage is not possible. Surface applied manure or fertilizer is subject to runof...

Practical Tips to Grow and Manage Cover Crops Jim Hoorman, Putnam County AGNR Extension Educator will be out of the office from July 20 through August 5th, teaching Cover Crops and Soil Ecology in China. If you have questions, please call the Extension office (419) 523-6294 or contact Curtis Young (419) 238-1214 in Van Wert County or Ed Lentz (419) 422-3851 in Hancock County. The following are 10 tips for growing and managing cover crops. Tip 1: Use cover crop mixtures composed of at least one grass, one legume, and one brassica or other diverse cover crop species. Mix summer annuals with fall and winter annuals to increase crop diversity. Tip 2: Select diverse species that maximize both sunlight and moisture interception. At least 50 percent of cover crop species should be low growing, another 30 percent intermediate, and 20 percent tall growing. Select cover crops that have a variety of taproots and fibrous root systems that incept moisture from different soil regions. The goal is ...

Jim Hoorman in a Sustainable Agriculture fact sheet discusses new information on how soil microbes recycle soil nutrients to plants. “Soil microorganisms exist in large numbers in the soil as long as there is a carbon source for energy. Bacteria, actinomycetes, and protozoa tolerate soil disturbance and dominate in tilled soils. Fungal and nematode populations tend to dominate no-till soils with live plants. There are more microbes in a teaspoon of soil than there are people on the earth. Microbes need regular supplies of soil organic matter (SOM) or carbon in the soil to survive. Long-term no-tilled soils or soil with continuous live plants have significantly higher levels of microbes, more active carbon (sugars), more SOM, and more stored carbon than conventional tilled soils. A majority of the microbes in the soil exist under starvation conditions and thus they tend to live in a dormant state, especially in tilled soils. Active roots supply 25-45% of their total root carbohydrates t...

The following article was written by Ed Lentz and Steve Culman, our new Soil Fertility Extension specialist who replaced Dr. Robert Mullen. “Boron, chloride, copper, iron, manganese, molybdenum, nickel and zinc are called micronutrients or trace elements, needed only in extremely small amounts for crop production. Calcium, magnesium and sulfur are called secondary nutrients since the crop needs larger amounts for production compared to micronutrients but considerably less than the primary nutrients of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium called macronutrients. Most Ohio soils have adequate amounts of micronutrients for corn production. They also generally have adequate secondary nutrients if proper pH has been maintained with lime and the soil is not sandy with low organic matter. Soil temperature and moisture are important factors. Cool, wet soils reduce the rate and amount of micronutrients that may be taken up by crops. As soil pH increases, the availability of micronutrients decrease...

While most farmers have purchased their corn and soybeans, they may not have purchased cover crop seed grown after wheat harvest. Now is the time to start making decisions on buying seed, because cover crop seed supplies are in short supply. The most common question I get on cover crops is: What is the best cover crop? It depends on what you want to accomplish. My favorite cover crop after wheat is Sorghum Sudan (SS) grass. Why? Because SS grass reduces soil compaction and improves soil structure, it adds carbon or soil organic matter (SOM), and it is a supplemental forage crop for beef, dairy, and sheep. Livestock eat it like candy! On our heavy clay soils (Paulding, Toledo, Hoytville) in Putnam County, SS grass has the ability to increase water infiltration, reduce water runoff and decrease ponding water. In the last 50 to 100 years, we have lost almost 60% of our soil organic matter, so by growing another crop, farmers can greatly increase their SOM levels. After wheat harvest is a ...