Counting Purple Soybean Flowers

I got lost hunting for fields this morning so I had to call LuAnn and Google a map for me. I was very near where I wanted to be but after many years of scouting that area I forgot exactly where it was.

No I don't use Street Pilot for scouting. I usually get copies of aerial maps with the field circled or highlighted and you hope they put the county roads on there so you can figure out where to go.

The primary job is to count soybean flowers and make sure they are all the same variety by description. This variety has purple flowers and tawny pubescence or reddish brown plant hairs in common language.

I was jealous of these non GMO beans but they looked like the ones I raised last year. They were dark black green, fairly tall but not too tall and loaded with flowers. The farmer had good weed control too for all the resistant weeds we have. His chemical program sure worked.

I hope they do better than mine did but they are related to the bean I had last year. That variety shucked all its pods in the heat and drought and the stems were blank 6 to 12 inches off the ground. I was not impressed with the yield.

That's the trouble with non GMO's today, most of the breeding investment is going to GMO's which farmers plant most. It's hard to find a good adapted variety that competes with the myriad of RR and LL varieties available.

I had mentioned to a chemical supplier the concern of glyphosate on soil and he sent me an email he received this morning pointing out everything I had mentioned to him and more. I have encouraged the National NoTill Conference to get some good speakers on the subject as there is a lot of confusion and unknowing out there that needs to be cleared up.

I was in a field yesterday that must have been sprayed with insecticide all season. It had the least bug holes in it I ever remember seeing. There was hardly a hole in a leaf in the whole field. If he didn't spray, he is really doing something right!

We are in our 12th consecutive day above 90 degrees and another 7 predicted which will more than break the record. We had so many last year I lost count. Cincinnati is saying 17 in a row is the record and we usually average 23? for the year? I need to check that out, my memory fails me if I don't take notes and who takes notes during the weather at lunch.

I don't know about you but I am tired of breaking records. It's been 7 years since our record breaking yields of 2004. I could sure use some more of that.

Keep cool,

Ed