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NE CO | When I first started growing dryland corn in NE CO, I planted 13,500/ac. After several years of good years of 60bu/ac yields, the seed dealers convinced me to move to the 16,000 populations. I still had yields of 60 bu/ac in average years, and much less in poor years. I have been planting only 8300 seeds/ac for the past 5 years, and don't think I have taken much of a hit for it, and in fact some years I have produced corn when neighbors with 13-16K populations have raised nothing. Last year, we had a lot of rain late in the season, and I had one field yield over 100 bu/acre, with high producing parts of the field peaking out at 160 bu/ac on the yield monitor, so a high flex corn can produce good yields with low populations. This year was very dry early, with some late rains, and yields averaged between 20-80 bu/ acre across the farm.
I probably live in a drier and more risky area for dryland corn than you do, but I still plan on staying in the 8-10K population range, especially with the new seed corn prices I have for this year. I do try and choose varieties of corn which will flex yield. I choose varieties which will set a good second ear when moisture is good and flex ear size as well. Not all seed companies can provide good information for selecting flex varieties for low populations, so you need to observe corn plant characteristics for each variety you plant. Also, weed control is more iffy at the low populations with late and sometimes never complete canopy. I had my best luck this year in late planted corn with pre-emerge application of 2 oz Balance Pro and 1# Atrazine. The RR corn gets too tall to spray before it canopies enough to control late emerging weeds unless you use a residual product. At these lower yields, controlling input costs is key. | |
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population on dryland corn
