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Short-season soybeans performing better in Wisconsin this year

More Wisconsin farmers are reporting better yields from their short-season soybean varieties this year.  One of them is Shane Goplin, who farms near Osseo. “I think that with that dry August, later maturities just weren’t mature enough and they aborted pods and the seed development wasn’t there, so we lost a lot more top-end yield on our later maturities.”

Goplin tells Brownfield he’s about 75% done with combining soybeans, and yields are better than he thought they would be but, “the seed size is small, you know, a lot of BBs this year. As far as yield, we’re seeing a lot of variability.”

Agronomists and Shawn Conley from the University of Wisconsin have also told Brownfield the later maturity beans have struggled compared to the shorter-season beans, in part because of the lack of rainfall during a key development time.

Goplin says he’s scouted some corn but has yet to start harvesting the 85-hundred acres for grain.  “It looks like that’s going to be in the same bag. It looks like we’re going to have some areas that are going to do pretty nice, but there’s going to be some shallow soils that are going to be junk.”

Goplin has wrapped up his corn silage harvest for the year.

He says Friday’s rainy weather made it a good shop and office workday, and finishing the soybeans will have to wait.