Current season primed for soybeans

The current seasonal conditions are moulding an ideal set of circumstances for soybeans as a late summer option according to Australian owned seed producer CSD Grains.

Speaking on CSD’s Web on Wednesday broadcast, extension and development agronomist Craig Farlow said soybeans have the ideal fit for growers looking for a late plant option.

“If you get an opportunity with some planting moisture, you can go straight back in and double crop into winter cereal stubble,” he said.

“It’s a fairly quick crop, so 90 – 120 days, so in terms of re-cropping after cereal and then getting that field back into production for the following winter again, its got a great fit and when you look at it from a hectare return per year, they’re quite a profitable crop,” he said.

“They’ve also got that added advantage where you don’t need that upfront nitrogen – that’s handy when you don’t have to pre-drill nitrogen and there’s also that cost saving,” he said.

In recent seasons the quality of planting seed had been a real concern within the industry and according to Craig Farlow, CSD Grains has looked to address this by offering quality assured seed.

“CSD has taken the same steps as it has with its cotton seed increase program following all the steps in quality assurance and then being able to supply growers with quality assured seed,” he said.

“Soybean has a particularly shallow seed coat so it’s very easy to get hairline cracks and damage to those seeds so we’re trying to take the best care from that moment of delivery by using bean ladders and being very careful in the way the seed is graded and bagged,” he said.

“We germ test that bag of seed only after the seed has been produced and bagged so growers can have confidence in the seed that’s been delivered on farm,” he said.

Craig Farlow said growers needed to be aware of their field history and do an accurate water budget before considering soybeans – particularly in the inland areas.

“Have a think back to what herbicides may have been used in the previous fallow or the previous crop as soybeans are very sensitive to some of the sulfonylurea products such as Ally® and Glean®, plus Tordon®, Atrazine and those sorts of products are also something to lookout for,” he said.

“In the inland areas, you need to be planning to water the crop – dryland opportunities are really limited to some of the tableland areas and coastal regions where there is higher rainfall,” he said.

“Soybeans aren’t really going to tolerate having an inadequate water supply so you really need to have an adequate water budget,” he said.

Craig Farlow also warned growers to consider their insect management, particularly sliverleaf whitefly, an imported pest that damaged crops in inland areas in the 2008/09 season.

He advised growers needed to avoid very late planting, avoid broad spectrum insecticides and consider neighbouring crops.

“You need to consider what other host crops are around particular fields as whitefly are going to migrate to some of those more favourable hosts crops and soybeans is probably near the top in terms of attractiveness to whitefly so that’s pretty important as other crops start to hay off,” he said.

14 December 2009

Further Information:
Cotton Seed Distributors 0267 950000