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Posted 20 November 2010. Crop Management. Poor Corn Yields Source: University of Ilinois Press Release. aces.illinois.edu Urbana-Champaign, Illinois (November 3, 2010)--Mike Roegge, Unit Educator, Adams-Brown Unit, says that the harvest of 2010 is essentially complete. And it was a double edged sword. The good news from this fall was that harvest started very early and ended fairly quickly, especially in light of last year. Grain moistures were much lower, the soils were much drier and there sure weren't lines at the elevator this year. Of course the bad news was the corn yields. It was known that it was going to be down from last year, but sure didn't expect it to be as low as it turned out to be. Way too many double digit corn yields were reported. Sure there were a few fields (mostly along the bluff which has such great draining soils) that had "decent" yields, but even these extremely good producing fields were much lower from the past few years. Looking back at the past 15 years' corn yields for Adams County, the lowest was in 1995 when corn averaged 113 bushels per acre. This year the average may be close to that figure.
Why were corn yields so poor this year? The bottom line was that soils were just too wet for too long. A plant root is a living organism. It has to breathe. When soils are saturated, there isn't any oxygen available. No oxygen means no root system. And the continued wet weather didn't allow the root system to repair itself. It's as simple as that. But not only did wet soils compromise root systems, they also caused a loss of nitrogen. When soils are anaerobic, bacteria still need to survive, and to do so they take oxygen from nitrate (NO3), leaving nitrogen dioxide (NO2) which is volatile and escapes. So the compromised root system had less nitrogen to feed the plant, which wasn't a good scenario. This fall, producers had opportunities to help "repair" the soil damaged by excessively wet conditions by doing some tillage. How much good was done with deep tillage this fall? Depends upon when and where the tillage was done. Through mid-October many soils were still extremely wet below 10-12 inch depth. The deep tillage tools that help break up compaction layers do little shattering when soils are wet. Under these conditions they simply slice through the soil, and may even cause smearing of the soil at deeper depths. But they do open up the ground to allow oxygen into the soil profile, which was very necessary. So in some cases, deep tillage didn't have the intended result of eliminating compacted soils, but did provide for some opening and aeration of the soil. The other purpose of tillage is to begin the decomposition process of corn stalks and get some corn residue buried. University of Illinois Extension provides equal opportunities in programs and employment. Extension programs and materials are research based and strive to meet the needs of people locally. If you need a reasonable accommodation to participate in this program, contact Rick Keim at 217-942-6996. Contact: |
