So last week was fun and productive. I do enjoy getting out and working with our sales people and Liquid dealers. On Monday I went to Arkansas and was met by SAM Jacob aka Jake. We met with a group of non-Liquid growers (for now) at the shop of one of our long-time Liquid growers in Colt, AR. In fact this grower, Tim Fisher, won the 2012 Arkasas Corn Growers Yield contest with 301 Bu/A. And the season was pretty hot and dry at times even with irrigation. But good crop nutrition sure helps. Tim thinks he has been using AgroLiquid for 14 years or so, and it was good to see him again. Then the next day Jake and I went to visit Farmers Supply in Marvell. They have been dealers of Liquid for at least a dozen years and I always enjoy seeing them. We met with one of the owners Chris and their sales agronomists on product info, research and new programs. Below Jake discusses soil tests and recommendations.
In the afternoon we went to call on another long-time Liquid customer. We saw quite a few fields with very large numbers of snow geese. They are said to be something of a nuisance eating up wheat. I guess that's one of those things that you just have to tolerate, there are seemingly millions. They are in season though. They will be moving on sometime soon.
We saw quite a few fields of tillage radishes as cover crops, as in this field at the grower we went to see. It was pretty warm out and you could smell them as they start to rot. Not too bad if you like sulfur gas. We have tillage radish on some fields of the NCRS, and I showed pictures in this here blog last fall. This is my first year with them, so I don't know what the spring will bring at our farm. I was curious if they would decompose without having to do tillage of them. At the No-Till conference they showed me pictures of them all rotted away without tillage. Time will tell.
On Thursday I flew up to North Dakota for some grower and dealer meetings. It was 75 degrees when I got off the plane Monday afternoon in Little Rock. Kevin and Mitch picked me up and we stayed in Bismarck for the night. Here it shows -17 on the GMC temperature gauge. Actually I was hoping for it to get down to -25 so I could experience a 100 degree temperature swing for the week. But 92 degrees is still a personal best.
We went to the metropolises of Wilton and Hurdsfield to talk to area growers about the virtues of using AgroLiquid. These meetings were hosted by the local Hefty Seed stores, and it was enjoyable getting to know them. The only thing I don't like is all of the traffic out there. I don't see how anyone ever gets anywhere.
I will say this: look for a lot of corn to be planted this year. In Arkansas and North Dakota, that was the talk. There will be very little cotton in Arkansas. There will still be some rice and soybeans, but corn is by far the biggest crop now. I remember when I used to go there years ago, and hardly anyone grew corn. Same with North Dakota. I recall in the early '90's when soybeans were a novelty there and corn was non-existant. Now through greatly improved genetics, corn and soybeans are common even that far north. There will still be wheat, field beans, sunflowers and canola, but corn is king. Well you know what happens when everyone plants the same crop, prices fall by harvest. There is plenty of talk about that in the air. But with talk of drought persistance in parts of the country and good prices still to be had, it's full steam ahead for corn in many states. And if you are going to grow corn, you might as well grow the best crop you can, and that takes AgroLiquid.
