From the Rows: How to Pull a Corn and Soybean Sample

August 17, 2012

By: Chip Flory, Pro Farmer Pro Farmer Editor

From the Rows - Chip Flory - How to Pull Corn and Soybean Samples

Your chance to participate in Crop Tour from home!

While we're scouting fields across the Corn Belt Aug. 20-23 on the Pro Farmer Midwest Crop Tour, you can participate with your own personalized corn data via the Pro Farmer Virtual Crop Tour. Starting Aug. 17, you will be able to access the Virtual Crop Tour page on www.profarmer.com. This will help you compare your yields to potential yields from across the Corn Belt and it will help us get a deeper understanding of the U.S. corn crop in a year full of uncertainty.

In each corn field -

Crop Tour scouts will get past the end rows and march 35 paces down the main rows. This helps preserve the randomness of plot selection.

- At the 35th pace, lay out a 30-foot plot and count all the ears that will make grain on two 30-foot rows.

- From one row, pull the 5th, 8th and 11th ears to include in the yield sample. These could be the three best, or worst, ears in the field, but this gives us a consistently random process to select sample ears.

- Measure the length of grain (in inches, rounded to the nearest one-quarter inch) on each ear (don't measure blank cob).

- Count the number of kernel rows around on each ear.

- Record the row width in the field.

To calculate the estimated yield, take the average number of ears in 30-foot of row TIMES the average length of grain per ear TIMES the average number of kernel rows around; divide the total by row width:

(47 ears X 6.5 inches X 16.7 kernel rows)/30 inch row