Soybean Watch: An aerial view of a field will reveal problems not visible from the ground…
A soybean field can look good from the road. Maybe it even looks good when you walk in 50 to 100 feet. Here is the real test: What does it look like from above? It’s possible to find out with drones and aerial images.
“It will certainly look different,” says Steve Gauck, a regional agronomy manager for Beck’s, sponsor of Soybean Watch ’24. Gauck lives near Greensburg, Ind. “If there are weed patches, holes of any kind, or if planting mistakes are still evident, the drone camera will pick them up.”
Gauck recently flew his DJI drone over the Soybean Watch ’24 field. It’s about 60 acres and features a large, eroded hill that runs the width of the field near one end, leading to a level, medium-textured loam soil over gravel at 34 to 40 inches on the far end of the field. It’s the perfect field layout that illustrates the value of a drone for taking crop images during the season.
“It’s the best way to find out what the crop looks like over the hill without doing a lot of walking,” Gauck says. “With soybeans in 15-inch rows, walking through them is a challenge this time of year.”
What camera saw
While the soybeans looked virtually problem-free from one end of the field, the drone images picked up a few issues across the field as a whole. It only took Gauck a few minutes to prepare the drone and complete the flight. The machine sent back images that he could watch live, and it allowed him to capture still images during the flight.
“It was easy to see from the air that just over the crest of the eroded hillside, soybeans weren’t as tall or as thick, based on the drone image,” Gauck says. “The dry spell for a couple weeks in June may have hit soybeans on that eroded hillside harder. There are soybeans there, but they are shorter, and the stand is thinner. Overall, though, it makes up a very small percentage of the field.”
Gauck also noticed a few bare spots, especially on the ends. Most are very short, bare strips. “Those are probably planter skips,” Gauck says. “Maybe the operator didn’t get the planter down soon enough a few times.”
It’s also easy to spot weeds breaking through the soybean canopy in mid- to late summer, he notes. By zooming in, sometimes it is even possible to identify which weed is escaping control.
Small, irregular, bare patches visible in an aerial photo are often caused by vole feeding, especially in a no-till soybean field such as this one. However, the camera only picked up one spot likely caused by vole feeding in the entire field.
“Flying the drone and examining the image doesn’t explain everything, but it does indicate spots where you should go look, doing ground-truthing to confirm what went wrong,” Gauck says. “It saves a lot of steps, while helping you do a better job of collecting information that will help you make better management decisions the next time around.”
From the field:
Areas seek rain as soybeans mature
You know what soybeans look like in your area. How do they look in other areas of the Midwest? Here are updates from Beck’s field agronomists across the country that shed insight on that question:
In Illinois. “Within the past seven to 10 days, symptoms of sudden death syndrome, also known simply as SDS, have appeared in the earliest-planted fields. These foliar symptoms can also mimic red crown rot, so we are aggressively monitoring this. Most areas could utilize rainfall to help fill pods.” — Chad Kalaher
In Nebraska. “We are in that boat of really needing a rain. Cooler temperatures over the past 10 days gave us a break from 95 degree F and higher heat we had for two weeks. The rain situation will make a difference between 70- and 50-bushel-per-acre beans.
“Low instances of SDS and white mold are reported in the most southeast parts of Nebraska. Dectes stem borer and soybean gall midge have been found across southeastern Nebraska, but control options are not available at this time for these pests.” — Trey Stephens
In Missouri. “Parts of western Missouri received a much-needed ‘state fair rain.’ As soybean pods continue to fill and progress into late reproductive stages, timely rains will be crucial for soybean crop condition. Before the rain, the soybean crop was looking rough in areas. It looks improved after the rain. However, the forecast outlook does not look favorable for more rainfall for the next seven to 10 days.
“There have been small amounts of cercospora leaf blight, which causes purple seed stain, show up. Sudden death syndrome is in certain areas, and we will keep an eye on frogeye leaf spot. A couple of insects that typically flare up during late reproductive stages include dectes stem borer and pod worms. We will scout for them.” — Celena Kipping
In Minnesota. “Many soybean fields are in the R5 stage, with some early-planted fields in R6. Weather has been favorable for both soybeans and aphid populations. Many locations within Minnesota have hit threshold levels in the last week, and insecticide treatments have been going on. Pod set looks fair, and more rain is in the forecast, which should help with the top clusters.
“Some sudden death syndrome, white mold and brown stem rot are showing up as well, which isn’t a big surprise from the season we’ve had in southern Minnesota.” — Dale Viktora
Source:https://www.farmprogress.com/soybean/view-soybeans-from-air-to-get-big-picture-
