Mark your calendars for Soybean Scout Schools in West and Middle Tennessee. The tentative schedule is listed below. More details will be announced later. This is your opportunity to learn more about crop and pest management in a hands-on program that last 1.5 – 2 hours. Continue reading
Stink Bugs. Thus far stink bug populations in soybean appear to be relatively low. In particular I have not seen or heard many reports of green stink bugs, which is usually our primary species. At this time of year, they often concentrate in the earliest soybean fields (those setting pods).
Our treatment threshold for stink bugs in soybean changed a couple of years ago. UT now suggests a threshold of 36 stink bugs per 100 sweeps from R1 to R7 . Continue reading
As reported by NASS on June 18, 2012
RAIN PROVIDED RELIEF IN SOME AREAS; CONTINUED DRY IN OTHERS
The weather pattern of scattered showers continued last week leaving 46 percent of Tennessee farmland short of soil moisture at week’s end. Crops continued to hold in mostly good condition. Forty-seven percent of the corn crop is in the critical pollination stage. Wheat harvest, soybean planting and tobacco transplanting are now about finished. Full-season soybeans are beginning to bloom and almost a third of the cotton crop is entering the squaring stage of development. As the hot Continue reading
Cotton prices are up while corn, soybean, and wheat prices are down for the week. The June U.S. Dollar Index before the close was at 81.59, down 0.97 for the week. The Dow Jones Industrial Average traded before the close at 12,759, up 205 points since last Friday. Crude Oil before the close traded at 83.99 a barrel, down 0.35 a barrel for the week. Although USDA released their monthly report June 12, most of this week’s market focus has been on weather forecasts, the European financial situation and whether the Federal Reserve will take action in the coming week or weeks to stimulate the economy. Continue reading
If you are noticing declining square retention even when no or below threshold numbers of plant bugs are detected four-bract squares may be the culprit. Malformed squares (extra bracts and extruding reproductive structures, see picture below) are being found in our planting date trial in Jackson. Continue reading
It was announced last week that a new insecticide containing the active ingredient sulfoxaflor, Transform 50 WG, was granted a Section 18 for use in Tennessee (link to previous article). Transform is made by Continue reading
So far I would have to say we’ve started out normally with tarnished plant bugs in cotton. There are treatment level plant bug populations present in some but not all fields. There have been reports of clouded plant bugs in the mix, and Continue reading
Do you know what this beetle is? I had several questions and was not identifying it correctly myself. This is Collops quadrimaculatus, a predatory beetle that feeds on all sorts of soft-bodied insects including aphids, whiteflies, mites, eggs and caterpillars. It has been seen commonly this year in soybean. Every so often I will try to do a “bug of the week” article.