This past weekend my dad and I sprayed our soybeans that were put in 3 weeks ago. If you want to put in some beans this year, it is still not too late. Two things happen when soybeans are put in late. One, yield generally goes down and two, you usually have to put in an earlier bean to make sure you have mature beans for the fall. So far, I am optimistic that our beans are off to a good start…and it looks like our electric fencing is keeping the deer out of a select number of plots we chose to save for later.
These are beans at 3 weeks from planting. Deer will hammer the green leaves and stems of the soybeans from the time it emerges until the pods are consumed in the fall and winter. My experience with planting all kinds and types of food for deer has led me to believe that soybeans are one of the best plots available and preferred over all others most of the time. At this stage of about 3-4 weeks is also a good time to spray for weeds.
This is my dad spraying one of our roundup ready bean plots with glysophate at a rate of 1 quart per acre. These beans are 3 weeks old and some weeds are starting to come in. You can see our electric fence in the background…so far it looks like deer are not entering the plots we chose to fence off but instead are feeding in other soybeans plots we left unfenced. All things being equal, if available, deer will feed the most heavily in soybean fields and alfalfa fields throughout summer.
Peppy,
How often do you spray your beans? Do you let the weeds dictate it or do you do it on a time basis?
Matt,
In the past I always tried to catch the weeds when the beans were about 6 inches tall and the weeds the same. My thought was if I could spray later then I would kill off the weeds and by the time the next round of weeds germinated or started coming back, the beans would canopy over preventing any new weed growth. Problem is, when you wait too long it is harder to kill off some weeds. Weeds are most easily killed when they are young. By waiting I always had problems with some grasses and pig-weed. So now, I really do one of two methods. The first, I spray earlier with glysophate to kill off all the early stage weed growth and then go back and spray again about 3 weeks to a month later just as the beans start to canopy over. Or, I spray early with a mix of 1 quart per acre glysophate and a herbicide called Thundermaster. Thundermaster also has a residual herbicide in it called Pursuit. The glysophate kills off any weeds that have already sprouted and the residual pursuit keeps any new weeds from germinating long enough for the beans to canopy over. In order for glysophate to work, the plant has to be out of the ground and growing…while pursuit residual works in the ground preventing the weeds from emerging at all. If you are going to spray twice with glysophate, hit them early at about 3-4 weeks from planting and then a few weeks later again before they canopy over. If using the residual, spay once at about 3-4 weeks.
Using either method I have had great weed control. For me it is hard to keep a close eye on them because my hunting grounds have never been right where I live. So two sprayings each year or the use of the residual has been the ticket. If you can keep close eye and time it perfectly you can get away with one spraying at about 5 weeks? Also, if you plant too thin or you have large pockets where the beans don’t canopy you might run into trouble with weeds that keep coming back. This year, I used the glysophate and residual method exclusively and it worked great.
Tom