Area Update … 'Bugs, Blight, and New Genetics'

The crop keeps moving. Earliest corn is through blister and into milk (R3), with the front edge pushing toward dough (R4) — kernels are set and the plant is now packing starch into them. Soybeans are running R4 (full pod) into R5 (beginning seed), with our fuller-season varieties a step behind the earlier ones.

This is the stretch where the crop starts showing what it's made of — and where the bugs and disease get interesting. Thistle caterpillars are the story in beans this week, the disease maps are warming up to our south, and Bob's got a look at three new hybrids racing each other in the plots. Here's where things stand.

GDU Accumulation

Since Apr 15 planting the territory has banked 1,840 GDUs, running 7% ahead of the 15-year trend. The chart shows the running departure day by day - green when we're ahead, gold when we're behind.

Rainfall

Season rainfall since Apr 1 stands at 16.6" against a normal of 18.8" - 11% behind normal. Rainfall was all over the map this week: parts around Le Sueur caught as much as 7" while Eagle Lake picked up 2.5". When totals swing that hard over a few miles, the rain gauge on your own farm is the only one that counts.

Estimated Black Layer Dates

Projected black layer dates for our top products, using actual territory GDUs banked to date (Apr 15 planting: 1,840 and Apr 22 planting: 1,790 and Apr 29 planting: 1,737 and May 6 planting: 1,710) plus 15-year average accumulation the rest of the way. Every product listed has already silked. Cooler-than-normal weather from here pushes these dates back; heat pulls them ahead. Planted outside these windows? Call me and I'll run your date.

Hybrid Watch — A Three-Way Race in the 101–103 Window

By Bob Joubert  ·  Sales Associate

P01851 hitting its stride — May 2 planting.

We have an exciting race to watch this season: three new hybrids in the 101–103 window, each making its own case.

P02405 got out of the ground in high gear — it stood out in the plots with strong, even emergence. From an early look it seems suited for soil prone to crusting or those earlier, marginal planting dates. It also carries an 8 for drought score and high plant health scores, so it looks like a fit on a lot of acres.

P01851 is really getting going now (pictured, from a May 2 planting). It may be better suited to ideal planting conditions and higher fertility levels — and it offers a nice ear flex score, which may be what gives it that extra top end in the right conditions.

P03951 is right there with them — a steady Eddy, go-anywhere hybrid, also scoring well on emergence and carrying a good drought score. A good consideration for a split planter.

We'll see what the combine says this fall — these three will be worth watching all the way to the scale. Want to see any of them up close? Ask me or any of us and we'll point you to a plot.

Insect Watch — Thistle Caterpillars Showing Up

Left: webbing in a local bean field this week — that's what you'll spot walking the rows. Right: the spiny, yellow-striped caterpillar you'll find when you pull one apart, along with the dark frass pellets. Close-up photo: University of Nebraska-Lincoln CropWatch.

Thistle caterpillars are the ones to know about right now. We're finding them in soybeans across the territory. The tell is leaves webbed or tied together into a little nest — pull one apart and you'll find a spiny black caterpillar with yellow striping feeding inside, along with dark frass pellets. They're the larvae of the painted lady butterfly, so populations blow in and can show up fast.

Some of what we're finding is already pupating right in the webbed nest — the larva quits feeding and forms a chrysalis. That's worth knowing before you make a spray decision: a nest with a pupa in it is damage that's already done, not damage that's still coming. Pull a few nests apart and see what stage you're actually looking at.

Here's the thing: the webbing makes it look worse than it usually is. The threshold is the same defoliation math as any leaf feeder — about 20% defoliation after bloom justifies a spray. And judge that across the whole canopy, not by the ugliest leaf you can find; it's easy to over-read damage when a few webbed nests catch your eye. Most years these collapse on their own from natural enemies and disease. Scout, keep an eye on the trend, and don't pull the trigger on appearances alone.

Soybean aphids: still almost nonexistent out there — a good story, and one we'll keep telling as long as it holds. But we're going to keep scouting right through R5 (beginning seed), because a late flare-up is exactly the kind of thing that gets missed when everybody's quit looking. Threshold remains 250 aphids per plant on 80% of plants and climbing.

Disease Tracker — The Map Is Warming Up

Each week during the season Pioneer scientists publish disease tracker maps built from field observations and modeling. Here's the latest read for our part of the world as of July 29. Use these as a heads-up on what's moving in the region — then confirm with your own boots in your own fields, because pressure varies field to field.

Read the fine print on the legend, because it changes how you use these maps: "Risk is the chance of seeing disease presence in a field." That's presence — not severity, not yield loss, not a spray trigger. A county in the green isn't a promise the disease isn't there; it means the odds of walking into it are still low. And as a county climbs toward yellow, what the map is really telling you is go look — your chances of finding it just went up. Think of the low and medium stages as a watch, not a warning. The decision still gets made in the field, on your own leaves.

On these maps, green is good: dark green is very low risk and the colors climb through yellow and orange to dark red for very high risk.

The picture has shifted from a couple weeks ago. Tar spot is the one to watch: medium-risk yellow now covers a wide band of southern Minnesota and is knocking on our southern counties, with a high-risk county showing to our southwest. Grey leaf spot is on a similar track, warming from the south with a high-risk county toward the Iowa border. Northern corn leaf blight stays low across the territory, and southern rust is quiet. None of this is a spray recommendation by itself — but if you sprayed at tassel, this is the setup where the second-pass question starts to matter, and if you didn't, it's time to be walking the lower canopy. Find something you're not sure about? Bring us a leaf or send a photo.

Tar Spot

Grey Leaf Spot

Northern Corn Leaf Blight

Southern Rust

What's Happening at NHS

Customer Appreciation is set — full flyers are attached to this email, and we'd love a headcount.

• Wednesday, Sept. 9 — Quiram's Seed Warehouse, Waterville. Come for the lunch session or the supper session (or both) — each includes an agronomy update, and the afternoon adds a marketing update from Jason Ward of Northstar Commodity. Supper served at 6:00.

• Thursday, Sept. 10 — Oak Farms Warehouse, Le Center. Marketing update from Northstar Commodity at 4:00, agronomy update at 5:15, supper at 6:30.

Please RSVP by Aug. 27 so we get the meal count right — call or text any of us. Times, addresses, and the full agendas are on the attached flyers.

Seats are filling — Pioneer HQ bus tour, Aug. 18-19. Two weeks out from our overnight trip to Johnston, Iowa: the 1,400-acre campus where Pioneer genetics get built — research plots, greenhouses, the genotyping and seed-quality labs, and the seed treatment center. We head down Tuesday afternoon (departure time and pickup spot coming to everyone who's signed up), tour Wednesday morning, and have you home by 6:00 Wednesday evening. Bring an overnight bag. The full itinerary is on the attached flyer. Spots are limited and going — call or text Tim at 507-995-0031, or any of the team, to claim yours.