Features
Agronomy
Cereals
Variable planting conditions in southern Ontario continue
The bi-weekly agri-business meeting of Ontario ministry extension personnel and seed and chemical company reps yielded several interesting notes, including highly variable corn planting, wheat acres that will be replanted and confirmation of a resistant weed biotype.
May 13, 2009 By Top Crop Manager
May 13, 2009
Planting conditions across a large section of southern Ontario remain variable, according to Ministry extension personnel and local certified crop advisors. At a breakfast meeting in Exeter on Tuesday, reports indicated corn planting as extremely variable, with some regions estimating 80 percent completed while others reported as little as 10 percent. Much of the problem across the region is the weather; frequent and heavy rains in some areas have pushed many growers off their land, and one dealer suggested some of his clients may wait another week, and if they can’t get on to their land by then, they’ll likely just opt out of corn completely.
Soybean planting has just begun, and if growers do make the switch from corn to soybeans in greater numbers, demand for soybean seed will tighten even more. Demand for IP soybeans into Eastern Ontario and Quebec also remain high.
On the wheat side, a representative from Agricorp noted that the insurance agency has received roughly 1500 calls provincially, regarding rough-looking crops. For much of the past 10 days, growers have been either plowing under or chemically burning down their wheat crops in advance of replanting. Estimates from Agricorp suggest the 1500 calls represent roughly 81,000 acres of wheat destined to be replanted, with about 700,000 acres of wheat still progressing across the province.
In an update to a news release last week from the University of Guelph, provincial extension personnel stated the case of suspected resistance to glyphosate in a giant ragweed biotype found on an Essex County farm has now been confirmed as resistant. The farm has been in a continuous glyphosate-tolerant corn and soybean rotation for six years, which was mentioned as a cause for concern.
Group 2 resistance is also coming back as an increasing issue for growers. The recent registration of flumioxazin (the active ingredient in Valtera) was cited as a benefit to growers needing another herbicide option.
On the pest side, it was noted that cereal leaf beetle thresholds have been reached in parts of Michigan and Ohio already, and there have been some army worm catches in Kentucky, although not in as great a concentration as in 2008. Still, growers and their dealers need to be alert and get scouting, and be ready to adapt to any rapidly developing changes in the onset of these and other pests.
