CCAs: No Silver Bullet to Managing Input Costs

Still, adjustments can make a difference

By Tracy Sayler

While there’s no silver bullet in dealing with higher input costs, producers can still take aim at adjustments that can make a difference.

Three certified crop advisors addressed the issue of higher input costs in a roundtable discussion at the recent Prairie Grains Conference.

From left, Dan Moser, Centrol Crop Consulting, Larimore, N.D.; Virgil Jons, Agassiz Crop Consulting, Moorhead, Minn.; and Craig Edwards, agronomist and manager of Triangle Agronomy, Ada, Minn., discussed crop production inputs at the recent Prairie Grains Conference in Grand Forks.

“Most guys I work with have done a good job of controlling their costs.  If there’s one thing that will dramatically lower their production costs, it’s not out there from what I can see. But there are still little things we can do to try to keep that line positive,” says Craig Edwards, agronomist and manager of Triangle Agronomy, Ada, Minn.

Edwards, along with Dan Moser, Centrol Crop Consulting, Larimore, N.D., and Virgil Jons, Agassiz Crop Consulting, Moorhead, Minn., point out tillage and soil sampling as obvious places to start making adjustments. Obvious, yet some producers this year will invariably make trips around the field that could have been combined with other field operations, and will put down fertilizer without taking proper credit for crop nutrients already in the ground.

Moser says he is working with more of his clients on doing zone soil sampling, which takes better account of mobile nutrients (especially nitrogen ) than grid sampling, and incorporates yield monitor data or remote imaging for a more accurate read of crop nutrients needs by topography.

Using starter fertilizer and split applications is another consideration in certain conditions and certain crops, such as corn.  “That’s one thing I’ve seen over the years, when corn yields and weather conditions look good, fine-tuning corn inputs and nutrients,” says Jons.

Undoubtedly, there’s going to be more soybean acres planted in 2006, and a number of fields that will be continuous beans.  Some growers seem to be doing okay with beans on beans, but it’s still a “can of worms,” says Edwards, at risk to increased disease and insect problems.

Growing glyphosate-resistant beans means less risk of herbicide carryover, opening the door for planting sugarbeets after soybeans. Still, there are production risks; rhizoctonia, for example, can affect both crops. “And it can be a lot more damaging in sugarbeets than soybeans,” says Moser.

Thus, while a certain amount of attrition in wheat acreage is expected this year, it is still a crop that is needed in a sound crop rotation.  “By and large the sugarbeet guys still need to set up their beet ground with grain,” says Moser. Edwards agrees that there’s a risk to riding soybeans, and points to past production problems in sunflower when rotations get out of balance. “It’s an example of a good economic crop that can be pushed too far,” says Edwards.