Ken Ferrie
Agronomist Ken Ferrie provides agronomic insights, crop management tips, and practical advice for farmers to improve crop yields.
What is vertical farming and how can it set you up for future government incentives? Ken Ferrie, Farm Journal field agronomist, explains it often requires mixing and matching tools for primary and secondary tillage.
If your combine monitor is showing a wide range of yields in the field, Ken Ferrie says to investigate. Evaluate soybean stand, pod set and bean size while there’s agronomic evidence.
Ken Ferrie offers five practical agronomic tips you can use during harvest this fall. These practices can help you improve corn performance and yield outcomes across your farm.
Weather woes took a huge bite out of corn yield potential this season, especially in northeast Iowa and parts of western Illinois. Where farmers got timely rains, the yield reports coming in are not as wide-ranging.
A calibrated monitor usually does a good job of telling you where yield is changing in a field within a hybrid, but it may not tell you exactly how one hybrid is yielding against another.
Yields can take a 5-bu.-per-acre hit as a result of the sickle running so high on stems it cuts off branches and allows them to fall below the deck. Losses can be reduced to 1 bu. per acre with header adjustments.
Ken Ferrie expects yields to climb as Illinois farmers start harvesting more of their May-planted corn. Looking ahead, he says farmers will see some challenges from herbicide carryover in 2024.
Out East, Ken Ferrie saw good corn crops with delayed maturity. Black layer will be pushed out to October. In the West, one Iowa field had the highest corn yield check of the season, while other fields were burned up.
In-field and classroom sessions will address making changes to your crop rotation, tillage systems or nutrient placement; managing early-planted soybeans; evaluating below-ground issues that impact corn yields; and more.
Farmers with cornfields affected two years ago need to be ready this season, based on a corn-soybean rotation. Fields with high levels of residue are more susceptible, and beware heavy rains just prior to canopy.