Author: Carrie Knott
Planning Unit: Plant and Soil Sciences
Major Program: Grain Crops
Outcome: Initial Outcome
In 2018 soybean seed companies and seed producers endured a particularly challenging year with the production of ‘seed’ soybean. ‘Seed’ soybean are the soybeans that were produced in 2018 to provide seed for producers to grow in 2019 for commercial production. Excessive, frequent rains made harvest of ‘seed’ soybean impossible. It is well known that multiple cycles of wetting/drying of soybean, which occurred in 2018, greatly reduces the vigor of soybean seed. This reduced vigor is of great concern for commercial producers, because the vigor of a seedling can be used to predict field emergence of soybean. To inform Kentucky producers of the potential for low seed vigor and essentially poor stand establishment I informed all county agents of this potential problem with an email, posted a blog article, and presented this information at numerous county and national presentations during the winter/spring of 2019. As encouraged in these materials, many Kentucky producers responded by submitting samples for vigor testing at the UK Seed Testing Lab. According to the Seed Testing Lab, vigor tests in the spring of 2019 increased by 350% for the same time period in 2018. The vigor ratings provided by the Seed Testing Lab will allow producers to adjust soybean seeding rates to ensure optimal stand establishment for the 2019 soybean crop.
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