What soybeans are you going to plant?

BLOOMINGTON — Illinois farmers considering what soybean varieties may be best to plant for 2010 may want to evaluate multi-year data for the best results. Illinois Soybean Association officials are finding statistics from the last two seasons must be kept in context with other recent year data to obtain the most reliable information.

“The biggest factor for 2010 seed selection is to not get overly emotional about what you saw in 2008 or 2009. Seed selection decisions should not be based solely on problems with white mold, aphids or sudden death syndrome. Those problems may overshadow what were truly the best performing varieties,” said Vince Davis, University of Illinois Extension soybean specialist, in a recent press release. “You can’t make decisions based on just one year’s experience either. Both 2008 and 2009 were similar anomalies that created odd data sets versus data sets that cover the last few years.”

Davis said too much rain in one year is unique, but two years in a row is exceptionally unique. Late planting in 2009 meant half of the state’s soybean acres did not get planted until early June.

“You can’t maximize yield when that happens. Soybeans needed to be in the ground about a month earlier than they were in many locations,” he said. “By the same token, those who planted on time and did not experience disease or insect pressure had good yields.”

That may help explain why Illinois soybean farmers in 2009 had an estimated average yield of 45 bushels per acre, down only slightly from the 2008 average yield of 47 bushels per acre.

“I would say 2009 was a year of extremes around the state, with soybean yields all over the map,” he said. “For example, farmers in northern Illinois who planted varieties not susceptible to white mold had above-average yields. Meanwhile, aphids moved farther south than usual this year and were around later in the season.”

Davis encouraged farmers for those reasons to take any single year data with a grain of salt.

“Some good news is that there were lots of good data on varietal susceptibility to white mold by public and private researchers. Many seed representatives will have information from this year that is more solid than usual for white mold scores, but it should still be compared with the overall yield potential from other locations and seasons,” he said.