Starting to wonder

[crappiefarmer]

Man, I wonder if I did something wrong? I have watched thunderstorms go all around me everyday in the last couple of weeks and it is really getting discouraging. weatherman has been promising me rain for this weekend and here it is Fri. night and all we have gotten is a trace. 5 miles south of me has gotten a flood. Crops are in critical shape and if we don't get a rain this weekend of at least an inch, then we are going to start to see some major yield loss. No sizable rain here since 1st week of may. This is the worst drought I have ever seen and I had to plant corn. I have had good rains come so close that I could hear it falling. Any showers that we have been getting have come from the edges of storms and have been very light. Good enough to grow a good stalk but I need a root soaker now. This is ridiculous. on top of that, the price of corn falls 85 cent in one week because the eastern corn belt got rain. Now I have a borderline failing crop and cheap grain prices. Being a farmer, you always have to be optimistic or you'll go crazy. My optimism is running out in a hurry. They are still calling for rains through tomorrow. I am praying hard but they are also calling for N.E. winds. We hardly ever get descent rains on a N.E. wind here. Sorry for the rant. I'm just frustrated as he*& and need to vent. I am past the point of being too worried to even get the urge to fish. can't see myself going fishing when your watching your livelyhood dry up and wither away. Kind of makes you sick on your stomach. I hope by Sunday, I will be able to post better news. If ya'll have gotten some descent rains lately, I am glad. Hope we get a good one here soon. CF

[TapOut64]

Same problem at my house in Virginia Beach, all the rain keeps skirting around us. Hopefully some will come your way soon.

[horseshoer]

Man I feel for ya. Most of the corn is tassling here and bottom leaves were starting to burn but Thurs night had 1.25" and last night 2.25. Like there it was very localized, I was 12 miles away in Williamsburg this morn and they got zip there yesterday. Comin back from fishin it was a downpour one place, dry road for several miles then could see it had rained again a stretch. Hope you get some Farmer.

[crappiefarmer]

We got 1 tenth on the corn and on a third of our beans. The rest of the beans got an inch. They are about 6 miles away from the corn. 5 miles south of the corn got 3 inches. Hope we get some on it this week. I would have gladly switched the rain from the far farms to the corn. They have already gotten 3 other nice rains that the corn didn't get. Crazy weather. CF

[ekim22]

I live off Route 5, close to Deep Bottom ramp....and just about every day last week we had a late afternoon storm come through....they seem to be following the river.

Friday afternoon I got home and wanted to go fish around the shores of Harrison but there was a big black cloud looming so I kept waiting and waiting for the shower to come through. Most times they only last 15 minutes or so...Finally I got tired of waiting and just went. The storm seemed to kind of just barely skirt around my house and the lake itself too. I was the only person there and had a really cool show of sorts watching the thunder clouds form about 10 miles behind the lake....saw some neat lightening.

[horseshoer]

Well ya had any rain Farmer? We have had about 3-4/10ths in the last week.
The garden holds moisture well where I have newspaper/feedsacks down & straw over that but late this evening I planted 5 25 ft rows of sweet corn where the cauliflower, brussel sprouts, & peas have been out awhile, and had raked up the straw after pulling everything up, and it wasnt DRY but plenty dry enuf to turn over & work in.
What do you think about planting sw corn this time of year? Too late? I planted Early Sunglow which is a 69 day maturity variety. I planted many a year back in TX this late but it was a hotter climate, with the warm weather
going deeper into the autumn than here. I believe date of average 1st frost was Dec 10th. But then again, I was planting Silver Queen which is 80-82 day corn. One way to find out I guess and I'm sure the weather at the very end of maturity will play a huge part in success/failure.

Farmer, what is the status of what is used in modern ag today to counter corn borers in field corn? So much has changed since I was around farming
I don't have a clue. I thought if it is a sprayable insecticide it might have cross-over application into the sweet corn patch. Let me tell ya that Poast
is some wonderful stuff now. I have spot-treated the nutgrass & crabgrass with Round Up and I can say that the Poast darn sure gets the roots and all.
If I were to meet the dude who invented that stuff I would kiss him full on the lips & even slip him some tongue. That sure convinced my garden to back off on its fight to return to open prairie.
Well hope ya got some rain man. Gimme an answer about the borers at yur convenience. I have always waited till the ears were in silk for a cpl weeks then took a bottle of mineral oil & a Q-tip and swabbed mineral oil on the silk and very tip of the ear. It works, the eggs cant hatch in the oil. But pretty labor-intensive. Wouldnt want to do a 5 acre plot. :D

[crappiefarmer]

Shoer,

I don't know anyone who has ever planted sweet corn this late. But, You might still have a chance if you can get the most earliest variety that you can find and get it in the ground right now. Find out what your first frost date is for your area and use that as your point of no return.

Field corn planted now has a Bio Tech poison in it to kill corn borers. This same BT toxin is in cotton. In corn it is called Yield Gaurd. In cotton it is called Boll Gaurd. they also have a BT in corn to kill root worms. This is called Root Gaurd. Before all this seed tech, we would spray corn either by plane or High Boy sprayer (if corn was short enough) with a pyriethroid insecticide. This is the same thing as Raid Or Hot Shot just a lot hotter with more active ingredient. I think the active ingredient in the Raid/Hot Shot cans is called Permethrin or something similar but they are all Pyriethroids. be careful spraying these because some are very hot and if you have fair skin, They can give you anything from a little tingle to a full blown wild man funky chicken kind of burn. It all depends on the person and how they can handle a little drift. The concentrate will smoke you so rinse immediately (I mean right now) if you get a drop on you. Best suggestion is use rubber gloves. When I spray the hottest versions, I get a little burning, tingling sensation on my eyelids and around my eyebrows and on up on my forehead from drift. This will last a few hours and seems to be worst at night. By next day for me it is gone. Best suggestion if you want to try some is wait for a breeze and stay up wind to keep drift away from you. Just use common sense and you'll be O.K.. I don't want to scare you off of it just want you to be careful with it cause like I say it can make you dance if you get a good dose of it. My dad can work in it all day with the drift blowing on him and it never bothers him. I'm kinda on the light burn side of it. Seen some people get skin blisters from the stuff. Just depends on you and how your body handles it. These are restrictive pesticides, so you will need a liscense to get them. But if you could get Poast, I'm sure you can get your hands on some insecticide. Your farmer Bud might have some scrap left that he needs to get rid of. Some good brand names that are hot include; Karate, Baythroid, Scout, Scout Xtra and others. Some milder Pyriethroids are Ammo and Pounce. We used POUNCE on our sweet corn. It is very mild and probably the safest of all the Insecticides. It is about as hot as Dog Dip. We also mix a bit in a windex spray bottle and spray our pants down when we have to walk through brush or the woods this time of year. Ticks last about a minute or two at the most once exposed. Never had a tick make it while using the stuff. Dad sprayed our sweet corn about 3 times with pounce about 5 days apart. It has worked good for we have had no insect damage. Just make sure you rinse your corn off good for safe measure before you cook it or put it up.

We still have not received a rain and corn is starting to fire up. I have seen what is the closest thing to a miracle as I have ever seen. We have a good crop of corn. only seen a couple of spots that did not pollunate to full potential. Still need a rain to fill out the corn and stop it from continuing to fire up. But it has gotten this far on an inch and a half rain that it recieved 2 months ago now. I have watched storms come buy so close I could smell the rain and hear it falling but never get a drop. the most nerve racking part is that it has been happening on a daily basis for about 3 weeks now. Storms keep making in the same places over and over again. If you have the ground moisture, you get the rain. If your dry, you stay that way. They are calling for a little better chances this week so maybe will get a shower or two. Hope this helps and if you need anymore info on corn or insecticides, Let me know. CF

[crappiefarmer]

Oh yeah, The combine has not been out yet. That may change today. CF

[Buffy]

Hey CF, I visited with my cousins from Warsaw, (VA) and they said it's about the same there, they've seen it raining on the other side of the river and go right by them. Does misery really love company? Their soybeans are having a hard time (since I know nothing about soy beans I assumed it was from lack of rain)
Good luck, I'll get back to the old two step.

[crappiefarmer]

Hey CF, I visited with my cousins from Warsaw, (VA) and they said it's about the same there, they've seen it raining on the other side of the river and go right by them. Does misery really love company? Their soybeans are having a hard time (since I know nothing about soy beans I assumed it was from lack of rain)
Good luck, I'll get back to the old two step.

Thanks for the dancing Buffy. Yeah the beans are suffering because of the drought. CF