“You guys better get
that old man off me before I get 60!
Doc, you are too old and need to retire.
You can’t guard me.” – Larry Bird
This quote comes from an infamous Friday
night game in the mid-1980’s at the Boston Garden when Larry Bird and Julius
Erving got into a bench clearing brawl during the game. You only hear short concise remarks from either
Larry or Julius about this particular game, and from what I can piece together,
neither are very fond of their own actions.
Larry’s trash talking went a little too far, bordering on disrespecting one
of the all-time greats of the game (but Larry did supposedly have 30 points at
the intermission). Dr. J’s response was
over the top as well – a couple Philly teammates held Larry’s arms while Dr. J
swung away wildly.
As you can see in the game log, Larry had 42
points, 7 rebounds and 3 assists in only 30 minutes of playing time. Meanwhile, Dr. J (starting his 14th
season) could only muster 6 points, 3 rebounds, and 5 assists over 23 minutes
of playing time. Supposedly, whenever
Bird make a basket during the game, he would immediately iterate two numbers –
how many points he had and how many points Erving had. When Larry tallied-up to “42-6” The Doctor had
enough of Larry’s oral and physical capabilities and the melee started. If Bird could have toned down his rhetoric, and
not been thrown out of the game, he probably would have had a shot at that 60-point
performance.
https://www.basketball-reference.com/boxscores/198411090BOS.html
This night of NBA action was from early
November of 1984 and only the fifth game of the regular season for Boston. The Celtics and Sixers had gone back and
forth over the past several years as Eastern Conference champions, and the
Celtics were the current defending NBA champions while the Sixers were the league
champions the year prior (1983).
Everyone talks about the Lakers and Celtics from the 1980’s, but in the
early part of the decade, the Celtics-76ers rivalry was as intense as it gets
and they played much more frequently which fueled the confrontations to a
higher level.
Larry got the last laugh on this particular
night as the Celtics won the game 130-119, but Julius had the longer career 16
seasons versus Larry’s 13. I’d say
Erving had significantly better career statistics (more total points, rebounds,
and steals), but the two players were very comparable on a “Per 36” minute
comparison (see link). Larry won three
NBA championships while The Dr. had one NBA championship and two ABA
championships. They are both all-time
great players and you couldn’t go wrong arguing who was the better all-star
small forward of the 70’s and 80’s.
https://stathead.com/basketball/pcm_finder.cgi?player_id2=bird...erving...
In the business of farming, you can’t go
wrong with either corn or soybeans; $6 corn and $15 soybeans should go a long
way to providing some profitable gains to help keep the bankers happy next
winter. Most farm managers like to mix
it up with a bit of both, but there are a couple farms that went 100% to corn
and conversely a couple farms that went 100% to soybeans this particular spring.
Regional Weather
The week looks to have high
temperatures in the low to mid 80’s to start the week, then progressively get
cooler after mid-week as a moisture front comes into the picture. If this forecast holds true, we should see
about 13-14 GDDs per day or a solid 90 GDD’s for the week.
The soil temperature chart (oFahrenheit)
comes from NDAWN at 9 am Monday, May 17th. Soil temps have built nicely over the past 7 days
and should help move the crops along at a quick pace. With many
locations reporting soil temps above 55F in the top 4-8” of soil, farm
operations with dry edible beans will probably start planting next week after
the cold front moves through as we hope to get some moisture to help aid
planting conditions. I highlighted in blue
all readings below 45F and gave the red highlights to any reading at or above
55F.
I’ll count on your weather app
for the best guidance through the 7-8 day forecast, but looking beyond that,
I’ve found this site from National Oceanic Atmospheric Association (NOAA) to be
fairly reliable for a general 8-14 day outlook (next week).
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/814day/index.php
For the last full week of May, the
forecast for our region looks to have slightly greater potential for below
average temperatures and above average precipitation – especially in northwest
Minnesota and southeast North Dakota.
The
NOAA organization also provides three month outlooks. If we would like to get a general feel for the
upcoming summer season (Jun-July-Aug), it can be seen here:
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/predictions/long_range/...
This
forecast continues to predict warmer than average temperatures (especially for
North Dakota) and below average precipitation potential
(especially western North Dakota). Hopefully, this week’s weather front will
carry more moisture than currently forecasted.
Corn Crop Development
Last week, I picked the mid-point of corn
planting as May 5th for the region.
The GDD map below shows growing degree day accumulation for the 2021 season
to date. I know some operations started
planting corn the week of April 20th and other operations delayed the start until
May 10th. If your operation
planted corn around the 25th of April, you can add about 40-50 GDDs
to these totals for your first planted fields.
Last week, I stated that it takes corn roughly about 125 GDD from planting to become emerged. Therefore, those mid to late April planted fields are starting to emerge, or will be fully emerged by the end of the week. My initial observations last week indicated good survivability of corn seedlings on those early planted fields and I’m interested to see how they look in a few days.
This site from the University of Perdue
describes corn development based on GDD’s as the crop progresses through the vegetative
stages: https://www.agry.purdue.edu/ext/corn... /VStagePrediction.html .
This
literature review indicates that it takes about 80-85 GDD’s to progress from
one vegetative leaf stage to the next. With
90 GDD’s predicted for this week, we could easily see V2-V3 corn
by the end of the month on many corn fields in the area.
USDA Crop Progress Report
Corn planting progress according to the
USDA has progressed to 80% complete across the country (67% last week). Today’s report (Monday, May 17th), also
reveals 61% of the nation’s soybeans are planted which is only 19% above last
week’s estimate of 42%.
For our region, the corn planting is 99%
complete, and with the rain in the forecast for the end of the week, the
soybeans will be very near 100% by then as well. The USDA report has North Dakota at only 63%
corn planting complete, and this is a good indication that these reports lag
when the planting pace is fast.
Of the nation’s corn acres that are
planted, 41% have emerged which is slightly ahead of the 5-year average of 35%. North Dakota reports 8% of corn acres have
emerged, compared to the 5-year average of 10%.
Spring wheat seeding is also ahead of
the average pace at 85% complete (5-year average of 71%). Of the spring wheat that is planted, about 47%
is emerged which is ahead of the 5-year average of 36%. North Dakota reports 84% complete with spring
wheat planting, and 36% of the wheat emerged within the state.
https://usda.library.cornell.edu/concern/publications/8336h188j
Soybeans Development and Early Weed
Control
Some of my counterparts in South Dakota are
talking about frost injury to soybeans in a few small geographies, but
hopefully we can stay away from those issues in the far northern plains.
A fair number of soybean
acres were seeded the last few days of April and into the first week of May
this spring. Since it only takes
approximately 90 GDD’s to get soybeans to emerge from planting, we should see
soybeans emerged or starting to emerge in early planted fields.
If your farm did not
plan on a pre-emergent herbicide application, you will want to start thinking
about post-herbicide timing. The
University of Nebraska-Lincoln published a CropWatch article back in 2009
revealing their research on the best timing for initiating post-emerge weed
control in soybeans. Their approach was
unique in that it evaluated this parameter based on various row spacings. Basically, the research pointed out that
wider rows (20”, 22”, or 30”) developed soybeans that were not able to compete
as aggressively against weeds.
Therefore, soybeans planted in wider rows (versus 7.5” – 15” rows) would
benefit more from an earlier first application of herbicide. As you can see in the chart below, 5% yield
reduction due to weed pressure occurs much earlier (V1/1st
trifoliate) in 30” rows versus 7.5” rows (V3/3rd trifoliate).
https://cropwatch.unl.edu/timing-post-emergence-weed-control...
An alternative way
to evaluate this research, would be the added benefit of pre-emerge use under
soybeans planted in wide rows. At a 5%
yield loss by V1 (I would think similar for 22” rows), equates to 2 bu/ac loss
on a 40 bu/ac production – if the post-em spray is not applied early enough.
Like most of you, I
like planted soybeans in 22” rows under conditions of high IDC pressure and/or
white mold pressure. However, there are
some trade-offs and the logistics of weed control is not something to overlook. At $14/bu commodity price we can easily
afford the custom applicator, or another spray rig to get the herbicide applied
timely and effectively to maximize our production potential.
Product Spotlight:
Utrisha N®
Corteva® made an announcement in April that
it would be partnering with a microbiological group (Symborg) to bring an
enhanced nutrient efficiency product to the market. The bacteria product will create a symbiotic
relationship with the plant to provide nitrogen from the atmosphere.
The unique aspect of Utrisha N® is the
application is with the sprayer in post-emerge applications – no additional
treatment on the seed or with the planter in-furrow.
The press release says it is available for a “broad range
of crops, including field and row crops, sugar cane, and turf and ornamental,
as well as range and pasture”. We
do have product for testing this spring/summer.
I would think high nitrogen use crops like corn, canola, and spring
wheat would be the more likely crops to see results and learn about the
product. Please stay in touch with me or
your local Corteva® crop protection rep if you have interest.
Random Agricultural Facts
Many things in our country resemble “America”, and two of these iconic items are baseball and agriculture. According to fivethirtyeight.com the two are more interlinked than we think. A couple of main components of a baseball are cowhide and wool yarn. Supposedly, it takes about 150 yards of yarn to wrap around a cork and rubber core to make one baseball. Interesting enough, as the baseball has gotten more “livelier” in the past several years, it’s not the variability around wool yarn or cowhide as suspects. It would be interesting to see some type of advanced cowhide or wool that could make the game more enlightening.
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/juiced-baseballs/#:~:text...
No comments:
Post a Comment