Soybeans may be viewed as the ‘poverty pea’ to some farmers, says Randy Dowdy, but the reality is there’s some real money to be made in soybeans. Dowdy says the sweet spot is the 100-bu.-per-acre range.
“The money is at 100 bu. [per acre]. It’s glamorous and it’s fun to make 150- or 200-bu. beans. When you technically look at it, for the amount of time you’re spending and for the amount of money you’re putting at risk, it’s just not worth spending it,” says Dowdy, the original founder of Total Acre, who’s known for pushing the envelope and big yields. “But 100-bu. beans are very attainable. We’ve got a lot of growers who have surpassed 100-bu. field averages on beans within Total Acre.”
Dowdy points out the first thing farmers need to explore is where they can get those “free bushels.” He says the most important factor is planting date, specifically the need to plant early.
“June 21 is the longest day of the year, last time I checked,” Dowdy says. “We need beans to be completely through flowering, or at least setting and filling pods, in the longest days of the year. So, planting as early as you can physically get in the field [is important].”
Habits are hard to break, and one of farmers’ long-held habits is planting corn first. Dowdy suggests planting corn based on soil conditions, and not based on the calendar. However, soybeans are a different story.
“Corn cannot have a bad day, but beans are tough. If they can survive that frost, I’d almost plant beans before I’d plant corn. It’s that simple. I plant beans first, and there’s a lot of people across this country that are adhering to that,” he adds. “Beans are just tough. We need the longest days of the year to make us some money there.”
The next piece to harvesting free soybean bushels, according to Dowdy, is singulation.
“One of the biggest things that everybody covets in a cornfield is that picket fence stand,” says Dowdy. “Corn needs to come out of the ground, it needs to be uniform, and it needs to be equidistantly spaced. Well, it’s equally important in beans, but that’s often the crop that everybody’s trying to get through with.”
Since soybeans are often planted last instead of first, farmers are in a rush to get the crop planted, and aren’t focused as much on solid stands when planting.
“Some farmers want to plant soybeans six, seven miles an hour. If they plant corn at five miles an hour, they’ll plant beans at six, just to get done with this poverty pea. But there’s a lot of free bushels to be made just by singulation, as well.”
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