Andrea Steed's Page

Hard as a… Brick?

Before the recent scattered showers, many fields were looking as pictured above. Very tough conditions for plants to emerge through and high soil tension causing cracking as it dries out! The strength these soybeans have used to come through (and lift) the more compacted ground is absolutely amazing! Soybeans are surprisingly capable at dealing with compacted and crusted soils but they don’t exert a specific or consistent pounds per square inch (PSI) when pushing through the soil. The force they exert is related to the energy required to lift the soil crust as they drag their cotyledons to the soil surface. This energy comes from the cotyledons (seed leaves) which serve as the emerging plant’s initial food source and is finite. The energy the seedling has to expend during emergence is affected by the seeding depth, soil type and the soil conditions.  This year in particular, we are noticing that soybeans seeded deeper than recommended into wet soils with higher clay content and pro

Let Those Emerged Soybeans Roll?

If you need to roll your soybean field (to press stones down, so they are not above the ground) and plants have already emerged, it is strongly recommended to wait until they reach the first trifoliate stage and the daily temperature is above 25°C. Most important is to pick a day, the hotter the better, when the plants are pliable (even if they are in second trifoliate or a bit later) and the soil surface is not too wet. Soft ground can also help. Always roll only a small test area first, and then get out on your hands and knees and examine those soybean plants to determine if rolling is damaging them or not. For those solid seeding, we recommend doing a stand count using a hoop to evaluate the job you are doing. Count all the plants in the hoop, then re-count the damaged ones and determine what percentage of plants are damaged in your test area. If the number of damaged plants is under 10% of the total plant stand, then continue rolling the rest of the field. If damage is above 10%,

Forage Without Borders

This article written by Dr. Reynold Bergen, BCRC Science Director, originally appeared in the June 2025 issue of Canadian Cattlemen magazine and is reprinted on BeefResearch.ca with permission of the publisher. About 20 years ago, Doug Wray drove in from Irricana, Alberta, to ask why the beef industry didn’t fund more forage breeding. Back then, the usual beef industry response to forage breeding proposals was “let the government and forage groups fund that.” Doug calmly explained that the forage groups he was active in don’t have a check-off. So, if beef cattle producers wanted better forage varieties, beef producers would need to invest in forage breeding. When we looked into it, we found there weren’t many forage breeders left in Canada. Universities and government administrators explained that low industry funding signaled that forage breeding wasn’t a priority. So, retired breeders weren’t replaced, and long-term breeding and management programs had been scaled back or closed.

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