Corn and Soybean Harvest Timing

BY Dairyland Seed Agronomy Team

Every year we seem to have some area, if not the whole Dairyland Seed footprint, challenged with weather and harvest delays. This fall is no different. The season got off to a dry start and now many of our clientele are dealing with dodging rain events. As we all know, this not just an issue for corn harvest, but especially true for soybeans. Are there management options we can look at to help us in the future to manage harvest better? We feel there are a few considerations that may help.

First and foremost, take good look at your corn and soybean maturities. Are we getting a good spread of maturity on your farm operation. Obviously, we can’t harvest the whole farm in day so why have it all ready or not ready at the same time. This is especially true of planting earlier maturing hybrids and varieties. Having a few fields to harvest a week early may have some keys benefits. Some of those benefits could include marketing options, early start on lime and fertilizer applications and tiling jobs. It also gives a chance to fine tune our harvest system just a little sooner. In the past there was a heavy yield penalty for planting early maturity products. With today’s advances in crop breeding, that differential is narrowing. There does exist a balancing act between maximizing our photosynthetic opportunities in a growing season and shortening up crop maturities.

As many of you may have read in our 2022 Product and Agronomy Research (PAR) report, we investigated a couple early harvest options for soybeans. One was the above-mentioned shortened maturities. The other was using herbicides to desiccate soybeans to facilitate earlier harvest. In this management option, we can gain yield and swing harvest up to a week earlier. A week of soybean harvest in September can certainly make a difference in late October when we are often trying to finish soybean harvest in less-than-ideal conditions.

From a corn harvest standpoint, our agronomy team investigated yield losses due to delayed harvest. We did note a yield penalty for delayed harvest and field drying in our research. One of the concerns with that research was the cost of commercial drying versus on-farm drying. Could we look at jumping to a maturity a few days earlier on a percentage of your corn acres? This would still give you an earlier start but mitigate some of the drying costs. Check out our website for the 2022 Product and Agronomy and Research report for further details on these studies and others.

Later this year, look for the 2023 edition of our research report available online, direct-mailed or contact your Dairyland Seed representative for a copy. We will feature discussions on a dozen research projects and interesting demonstrations in this year’s edition. Throughout the late fall and winter, we will have in depth presentations on key projects via local agronomy meetings and the ever-convenient Dairyland Seed Café.