Our crops are at the stage where their rate of growth is accelerating daily. It is exhilarating to watch the transformation from infant seedlings to reproductive adulthood in a few short months.

Unfortunately, the weed species that are most difficult to control share this trait.   

Thanks to advances in application technology, our ability to accurately apply chemicals at the ideal time and dosage has improved dramatically.   

In theory, just in time delivery of herbicides and nutrients to the plant allows for more effective control and improved response with less active ingredient.

In practice, it's more complicated. Weather conditions need to be favorable to encourage herbicide uptake while minimizing impacts to neighboring fields and farmsteads.     .

It is not as wet as last year so we have more days available for fieldwork. The bad news is warm weather has encouraged robust weed growth while unusually windy weather has hampered our ability to spray.   

Weeds are out competing field crops on farms that have not received post emergence herbicides. This is not a desirable situation, but is not catastrophic.

Herbicide dosage will be adjusted to achieve weed control and an increment of yield potential will be lost.

Ben and Andy each lead a spray Team. Depending on field size and weather conditions, they can each cover 10-1200 acres/day. Our JD sprayers are reliable and breakdowns are infrequent.

We were reminded of this fact last week when Chris was enlisted for emergency boom repairs on Ben's machine. This was the first metal fatigue failure on his machine in five years.

Dirk runs the dry spreader applying urea. Each corn acre receives a second dose of nitrogen. Rates vary depending on manure application, previous crop and yield goal.

Bert scouts fields and coordinates agronomy Team assignments. He has around eight to ten men in this group. 

Dan and Dylan run the bat wing mowers, keeping grass short in waterways and eliminating opportunistic plants in the margin between the waterway boundary and worked ground. 

For spraying fence lines, we designed a vertical boom that targets the narrow strip of grass between fields. It has greatly improved the safety and productivity of this operation.

Alex and Joe take turns running the fence line sprayer and spot spraying glyphosate around buildings.

As of mid-June, 90% of our crops would be considered in good to excellent condition. Our bean crop looks especially promising.

With three and a half months till harvest, there are a range of possible outcomes.

"Best crop ever" is on that list.

We'll do everything in our control to make that happen.

 Jim