Are You in Control of Your 2024 Planting Plan?

With planting season approaching quickly, now is the time to start taking control of your 2024 planting plan. Recently I’ve discussed in depth the four key principles to high yield planting which include: finding the balance of near perfect soil conditions, ideal seed placement and depth at planting, superior seed quality to help overcome the obstacles of planting season, and ensuring the right hybrid is placed on the right acre. 

These four key principles must remain the building blocks of a strong planting plan each season, however, each year provides you a new opportunity to hone in on the approach of each element. For this week’s blog, I’ll challenge you to rethink some of the most commonly held planting practices and ground them in our four key principles to help you take control of your upcoming planting plan.

Early or Late Planting?

As you prepare your planting plan, one of the first lines of questioning from farmers is often around the concept of early or late planting. “Will I get the best yield by planting early or late? And if I choose to go early, how early is early? But if I go late, how late is late?”

Typically, most farmers in our area consider early planting in Western Kansas to fall between April 28-May 5 and late planting around May 15-25. But this year I challenge you to focus less on the date itself, and more upon the principles of targeting near perfect soil conditions and ideal seed placement.

I’ve seen instances where early corn has far out yielded late corn. This is done by planting properly into near perfect soil conditions and not focusing on the date of planting. When you are planting early, remember that soil temperatures tend to fluctuate a lot more earlier in the planting season, this is where deeper planting really shines. Why plant deeper in when you plant early? Because the deeper you go the less the temperature fluctuates, meaning when you plant deeper the lowest soil temperature of the day will be higher, so the chilling effect happens less often. 

Ignore the Long-Term Forecast

None of us can foresee how every millisecond of weather throughout the season can contribute or take from our yield at harvest. I don’t have that crystal ball, and believe me if I did these blogs would look a whole lot different. 

So instead of focusing on the big picture of weather throughout the season, narrow your focus to the period between planting and emergence with an emphasis on the window at planting. Why the planting window? Staying on top of the near-term forecast can help you understand how static your soil conditions will be once the seed is in the ground. 

Now, I get it, we can’t always control the whims of what Mother Nature will bring, even with a keen eye on the upcoming week’s weather. That’s what seed quality is for! Planting a product with a high seed quality will help you overcome any variables outside of your control that pop up during planting. And that’s where the high-quality standards of Axis Seed come into play, when you plant Axis Corn Seed, you know that you are taking to the field seed that’s selected for your growing conditions, and tested for its ability to withstand whatever conditions mother nature throws at it by having the highest quality standards in the industry.

Consider a Shift in Planting Strategy

It’s easy to get caught up in the craziness of planting season. The days never seem long enough, the pop up spring rain messes with your day’s perfect plan, and before you know it the race is on and planting quickly becomes priority number one.

This year, I challenge you to shift away from urgency to mixed maturity. Mitigating the effects of planting season we cannot control can be done by using the entirety of your product portfolio to your advantage.

A lot of farmers like to plant by maturity, and I get it. It’s an easy way to keep things straight. But doing so can set that entire portfolio up for problems ahead with a single, untimely weather event. Having a mixed maturity that you’re planting at any time helps reduce this risk. 

When you plant don’t plant all of any one maturity at the same time, first plant some of the 113RM, then some of your 110RM and finally some of the 105RM or 95RM. By the time you’ve made it through the entire portfolio, start over and do it again with the rest. This method mixes your maturities up across the farm and mitigates the impact of the uncontrollable weather. Is this the easiest approach to planting? No. But most times a little extra elbow grease goes a long way, and when you’re betting against Mother Nature, you need to be playing with all the cards you have.

When utilizing this method just make sure you ground it in your “right hybrid, right acre” plan. Remember there are certain hybrids in your planting plan with a purpose specific to a certain field on your operation. It’s crucial that you follow that plan!

Being in control of your 2024 planting plan first takes a commitment to the four key principles of high yield planting and a deliberate challenge on the assumptions and habits we often fall into this time of year. If you need support as you consider trying something new this planting season, look no further than Red Barn! We’re here to make planting great again! Even if it looks a little different than it has ever before.

This post was written by Axis Seed – Red Barn Enterprises President and resident corn expert, Matt Long.