Ferrie: Reduce Header Losses In Soybeans To Pick Up $50 More Per Acre

As you combine soybeans this harvest, beware leaving yield in the field from header loss. As Ken Ferrie checked fields and combine settings this week across central Illinois, he saw some growers were experiencing a 5-bu.-per-acre header loss.

“Most of this was coming from pods left on the lower stem and branches with pods on them laying on the ground,” says Ferrie, Farm Journal field agronomist and owner of Crop-Tech Consulting, Heyworth, Ill.

Ferrie explains the sickle was running high enough on the stem that it was cutting the branches off and allowing them to fall below the deck. To address the problem, he had combine operators tip the nose of the deck down, pull the reel in and slow down on their ground speed. 

“We were able to cut this header loss to 1 bushel per acre, bumping yields 4 bu.,” he reports. “For $50 an acre it is well worth the time.”

Lower Node Branching Is A Problem Now

Ferrie says that due to the amount of lower node branching this year in 30-inch soybeans, he anticipates this is going to be a problem across numerous Illinois fields. 

“We just don't want to be cutting that stem above those branches if we can't get the branch to stay with us and make it into the head,” he says. “When running deck tip down, you're going to have to know where your rocky areas are so we're not scooping up rocks, especially around old building sites. Running the deck that close may also give us fits if the beans pick up moisture. They want to bunch up instead of sliding under the deck. The growers who are calibrating told me that for 50 bucks, they would wait for the beans to dry a little,” Ferrie adds.

While not a lot of bean yields have been reported yet in central Illinois, the early planted, early maturing varieties have been ringing the yield bell well. 

“I’m hearing a lot of mid-70s to mid-80s on the yield. I am a little concerned about some of the later planted, full-season beans that have turned too fast this past week. Instead of moving from green to light green to yellow, some of these fields have gone from green to orange-brown with dead leaves at the top in a few days.

"Looking at these fields, this is Anthracnose disease and it's caught some of these late beans. When I'm walking through them I'm seeing some flat pods and smaller bean sizes. Now these beans did pod well, so I hope this doesn't bring the yield too much. Time will tell if these full-season beans later planted are going to get tagged,” he adds.

2023 Yield Maps Are Worth Gold
As corn harvest picks up steam, Ferrie is seeing and hearing about tough yield results coming out of eastern and northeastern Iowa as well as from southern Minnesota. 

“Reports of sub-100-bushel cornfields and some bean yields in that 30-bushel range are not uncommon,” he says. “I do believe this could involve about a third of the state of Iowa, as well as a third of the crop production area of Minnesota. It will be interesting to see if the western part of Wisconsin gets clipped in this, too.”

The toughest reports coming in are from those areas of the Midwest that the weekly U.S. Drought Monitor has characterized as being D3 and D4 drought areas. Those areas have reported 100-bushel corn yield swings from light ground to heavier ground.

The latest U.S. Drought Monitor, released every Thursday, illustrates the severity of drought in some parts of the U.S. Currently, it says 58% of corn acres and 53% of soybean acres are in drought conditions, as harvest ramps up.

“The 2023 yield maps will be worth gold to growers who are thinking about implementing variable rate populations. That means you need to take the time to spatially calibrate your combines,” Ferrie encourages.

He says his GIS crews who build yield zones and soil-testing zone frequently refer to the 2012 yield maps, which represent a dry year, and the 2015 yield maps, which represent some of the wetter conditions row-crop fields have experienced in recent years. The information gleaned helps them in the process of building and refining zones.  

“Years like this will not only show the light soil, but they'll help us identify things like perched water tables and sand lenses,” Ferrie says. “This year's yield maps will be valuable in decision making for the next decade. So when you got a year like this that comes around every 10 to 12 years, you got to make the best of it with your spatial maps.”

The natural tendency when yields are subpar is to get frustrated and not invest the time to calibrate. But Ferrie says don’t give into the frustration as you’ll reap benefits from the effort for the next decade.

Hybrids Are Falling Apart At The Base
Ferrie is telling crop scouts if they find a hybrid in trouble, not passing the push test, check it wherever it’s planted.

“These hybrids are coming apart from stalk rot, but they're still yielding well,” he says. “So some of these hybrids obviously would cannibalize the stalk to maintain kernel fill. As scouts out there, we have to keep pushing these plants on a weekly basis, because I do believe we're going to see more trouble.”

Likewise, Ferrie says combine operators need to follow the harvest schedule when the scouts provide it. 

“I know this is going to cause some jumping around with equipment, but anything is better than picking down corn,” he says. “Most of these plants have been tapped hard this summer to deal with the dry weather. So I do expect standability to be a challenge in all the fields as the season wears on. We're going to have to stay on top of it.”

Below are the percentages of crops in drought conditions as of this week:

In most cases, Ferrie says the real light ground and sandy areas are pulling back on yield, as you would expect due to lack of water. But in some of the heavier ground, he is getting reports that the low ground is not keeping up with the higher elevations. He says that is backwards from what you would expect. 

“If this happens, stop and take a look at the ear count and plant conditions,” Ferrie advises. “In some cases, it may be lack of ear count due to emergence issues or frost. Most fields are showing more stalk disease in the low ground with 25% to 30% of the ears hanging down on dead plants, while the plant health is better in the high ground."

In many cases, this is what Ferrie says he is seeing in VRT planted fields where the populations were pulled back on the higher ground, relieving some of that stress.

"Stopping to identify the cause with some of the crop out there to observe is better than guessing at it at the yield map meeting this winter. Take some pictures, do some counts,” he says.

You can evaluate the success of your harvest. See here: Now's the Time to Prep for Harvest Analysis

Corn Test Plot Results
In the following Boots In The Field podcast, Ferrie addresses the latest agronomic insights for corn and soybeans and also initial thoughts on Farm Journal test plot results. Listen here: