 Thursday saw the Pamlico and Craven Counties corn and soybean tour. Dr. Jim Dunphy, NC State Professor and Extension Soybean Specialist was in attendance:
“Well, I think what we’re seeing today is typical of much of the state, particularly in the southeastern part of the state. It’s very spotty, there’s some good looking fields, and then not too far away there’s some that look pretty meager, they’ve just been awfully hot and dry for an awfully long time. Enough so, that they’ve modified their tour today because some of the fields that they were planning to stop at just simply haven't got enough growth to show. But, I think that’s rather typical for this year, particularly in the southeast. It’s been very spotty, we’ve got some good crops growing off the coast, and then we’ve got some mediocre crops.”
With rainfall being such a challenge this year, the double-crop beans are what are really suffering:
“Oh, I think so. With this real hot weather, particularly with the lack of moisture, they just don’t do much growing, and our double-crop beans-- that’s our biggest obstacle they face in the first place; is do they have enough time to get big enough to get the job done. So, they can ill afford to lose extra days of growing time, and with this weather that’s exactly what’s happening. So, those are going to be the ones that are going to suffer. And right now the full-season beans look better than the double-crop beans, and are probably will continue to until we get rid of this hot weather.”
While disease and insect pressure haven’t been a problem in soybeans thus far, Dunphy says that with the hot, dry weather, the crop is progressing faster than normal:
“Particularly in the Piedmont, we’ve got some pretty respectable looking beans, there’s significant areas of the Piedmont that have gotten pretty good rains, and crops are showing the benefit of it. If anything, crops are probably running ahead of schedule, flowering a little earlier than they normally, which we would expect with the hot weather, and going ahead and setting pods a little earlier than they normally would.”
While full season soybeans seem to be doing okay, corn, down east is another story:
“Corn looks much worse than soybeans. A lot of the corn is head-high or shorter, and corn typically doesn’t tolerate the hot weather as well as some other crops like cotton and soybeans do, and I think a lot of corn in the area is showing exactly that. Not a real pretty sight.”
Dr. Jim Dunphy, NC State Extension Soybean Specialist
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