The Weed Resistance Cycle

Whether you’re battling pigweed, horseweed, or ragweed, herbicide-resistant weeds have declared war on farmers in North Carolina and across the United States. With the number of species and types of chemistries with resistance continuing to grow, it will take all weapons available to defend our farms. But replacing one herbicide chemistry with the next won’t…

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Thinking About Cover Crops?

    Interest in cover crops is increasing as a number of groups have demonstrated higher yields and improved soil health from incorporating them into an operation. But adopting cover crops is not a one-size-fits-all solution for growers and there many different options that may provide different benefits for different operations.   Cover crops have…

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Time of Spraying and Herbicide Efficacy

When it comes to weed control, growers must use every tool in their toolbox to fight the battle. One of the often overlooked tools is ensuring maximum herbicide efficacy through time of spraying. Over the last few years, a number of different research groups from universities across the Southeast have been looking at the impact…

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Time to Scout for Disease

With over 75% of the North Carolina soybean crop flowering and 50% setting pods, now is the time to start thinking about how disease pressure may affect your crop. Getting in the field and looking for foliar or stem diseases is critical to determining what diseases are present and if a fungicide application is needed.…

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Time to Start Scouting for Pod-Feeders

As much of the soybean crop begins to move into reproductive stages, it’s time to start scouting for pod feeding insects. Our common pod feeding insects include corn earworm and stink bugs. In some areas of the state, stink bugs seem to be a real problem this year.  And, corn earworm traps across the state…

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Time to Start Thinking About Variety Selection

Proper variety selection is one of the first steps in producing a high-yielding, healthy crop. Choosing an appropriate variety is one of the most important decisions a soybean producer will make and one of the hardest because there are so many varieties available. Each variety has specific strengths and weaknesses that make it more- or…

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Tips for Soybean Variety Selection

Proper variety selection is one of the most important steps a soybean producer can make. It is important to devote some time to selecting the proper variety as this decision is one of the first steps to maximizing yields. If we compare the top 10% of soybean varieties grown within a single maturity group at…

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To Harvest, or Not to Harvest

With many water-damaged soybeans across the state, growers question whether to harvest these crops or not. NCSU’s Ag Resources Economist Dr. Nick Piggot has put together some suggestions for answering this question. The first thing a grower needs to do is calculate what the break-even yield is to warrant combining the field. This is the minimum yield…

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Update Regarding Court Ruling on Dicamba

On June 3 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth District issued a ruling vacating U.S. registrations of three dicamba herbicides (XtendiMax, Engenia, FeXapan). This ruling has left much confusion across the industry and producers have heard many different things from various sources about the sale and use of these products. We hope to…

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