Much of the Midwest and Upper South will face torrential rains if the forecasts for this weekend are accurate, so if you’re stuck inside and can’t plant anytime soon, you might as well double check your planter is ready to go once your fields dry up.
Farm Journal Field Agronomist Missy Bauer joined AgriTalk host Chip Flory this week to talk about planter setup tips. Bauer has been called the “Queen of Planter Setup” due to the wealth of experience and knowledge she has to share about getting your planter ready to rock.
“It’s really about those little details … those last-minute details are really important,” Bauer says. “Before the planter pulls out of that shop, we need to make sure our gauge wheels are set.”
Nearly 90% of the planters she sees out running ground have the gauge wheels set too loose, which can result in dry soil getting flung down into the seed trench, she adds. You want good seed-to-soil contact with warm, moist soil at planting for strong and uniform emergence.
Bauer, who operates B&M Crop Consulting, advises once your gauge wheels are set correctly, you need to keep checking them throughout the planting season.
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From there, make sure you carefully go over your disc openers to check for warping. Bauer says farmers are doing a good job changing out worn disc openers, but it’s critical they check each wheel and make sure there is less than a quarter-inch of variation. You can take two business cards and slide one in from the bottom and one in from the top and see where they come together to see how uniform the openers are, Bauer says.
“That’s real important on those John Deere and Kinze planters, the red planters are a little bit different in that respect,” she adds.
Your planter down pressure system should be another key focus of your pre-field inspections. If you’re planting corn and your goal is precise 2” deep seed placement, Bauer says to plant a few rows and get out and check to make sure you’re actually hitting the target. If not, or if you’re planting too deep, it’s time to make some adjustments to the down pressure settings in the monitor.
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“Again, you have what you have, as far as technology for this year on your planter, but doing those extra checks in the field and making sure you’re running with the adequate amount of pressure is pretty critical, too,” she says.
And lastly, setting the stage in your fields for strong seed emergence is another critical step, according to Bauer. When you’re making that final seed prep tillage pass, be diligent about checking that the tillage tool is staying level and is doing what you want it to.
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“Making sure we got a good seed bed is important,” she says. “And if you’re on the no-till side of things, with all the moisture we’re getting, there are a lot of weeds coming. So think about burn down and starting clean for planting, so we’re not planting into a weed mat, I think that’s something you don’t want to overlook this year, because margins are tight and they’re going to be tight for the year. So any little details I can put into planting, making sure I can have the best (outcome) on the bushel side is important.”
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