Welcome rain

There was quite a bit of rain across the southern and eastern tillage areas in the past week and it was generally needed and welcome in those regions.

It helped to bring up the rainfall amount to date as some of these areas were only on 36-45% of annual rainfall at the end of August.

This left considerable fears as to when the balance would fall, possibly during the planting season.

Many of the main tillage areas in the east and southeast got between 8% and 10% of their annual rainfall in the past week and much of the country is now up around 50-60% of normal, but lower than this time last year.

As we move into the second half of September the hope is that there will be good weather windows for planting.

The temptation will be to start towards the end of this week, but we must remember the lessons learned this year about the risks of early planting.

It would be safer to consider sowing from the middle of next week across the northern half of the country and into October further south.

But forecast and ground conditions will dictate such decisions. The calendar guides the sowing date, but the weather which follows amplifies the risks.

With winter oilseed rape and catch crops now planted, the next safest crop seems to be rye. There are still some spring crops to be harvested.

Stubbles

Most stubble ground to be left over winter must be cultivated this year. Sowing a catch crop or a winter crop fulfils this requirement also, as the objective is to have plants growing to take up nutrients.

There has been good establishment of catch crops and there are also a lot of crop volunteers on stubbles.

With ground still relatively dry and no soil damage during harvest, this could be a good year to try some min-till planting on cultivated ground to help decrease establishment costs. But only try it in fields that have good soil structure.

Poor soil condition is more likely to result in decreased yield with min-till. Fix the soil first then save the money on establishment costs. Commitment to a bit of min-till could also earn income as an ACRES option.

Planting

It is now late for winter oilseed rape, except in warmer areas where there will be growth for some time yet. The increased area has led to supply challenges with herbicides, but residuals seem to be coming back on stream.

If spraying these after crop emergence, make sure to take note of the physical size of the weeds present as they may not be killed.

As we move towards other cereals, it is important to remember that “later is safer” but this must be balanced against the risk of not getting crop planted in a wet October.

So there must be some practical balance between early and late where there are big acres to be planted.

As we move into week 38 it is inevitable that there will be some planting of winter wheat and barley.

Opting for a BYDV-tolerant variety like KWS Joyau may lessen virus problems but it will do nothing to reduce pressure from grass weeds or take-all with very early sowing.