Casey Staloch reveals his tips for increasing yields on soybeans.

Casey Staloch raised his first 80-bushel soybean crop just north of Freeborn, Minnesota in 2020. He planted Viking 2418N soybeans, which is a conventional, non-GMO soybean variety. He is not only a farmer and grower for Albert Lea Seed, he also is the owner of AgriGuardian.

“It was a good feeling, because I’ve never had 80-bushel beans before,” Casey explained. “This is my seventh year of farming, so we’ve definitely been trying different strategies to get there.”

In this video, Casey shares, from start to finish, what he did pre-planting to harvest, attributing his incredible yield to some very down-to-earth advice: Give the plants what they want, when they want it. The star of the show, in Casey’s estimation, was foliar feeding.

CASEY’S CRIB NOTES

Casey pointed to some of the best practices he used to reach his 80-bushel beans.

Soil Samples / Soil Correction: Casey suggests the biggest thing you want to focus on in your soil samples is the pH level. “Get that corrected first. If you don’t have your pH corrected, it doesn’t matter what you put out there. Nothing is going to be available to your plants.”

Field Drainage. Because soybeans don’t like wet feet, Casey also suggested that farmers look at field drainage. Whether a field needs drain tile or just soil amendments, farmers need to improve drainage for the best yields.

Tissue Testing. As an advocate for tissue testing, Casey uses the information in the test results to identify what the plants are craving and providing it to them when they need it.

Foliar Feeding. The benefits of foliar feeding, according to Casey, are demonstrable. “When you apply a foliar spray, it’s available within that plant within minutes compared to adding dry products that need to go through reactions in the soil to become available. With foliar feeding, we’re getting additional growth. We’re shortening the nodes, and we’re filling out our pods. We’re not having the pod abortion, flower abortion, seed abortion that a lot of guys see.”

Please refer to Casey’s video discussion for more specifics on the foliar products he used in additional application passes.

Casey Staloch – Setting Up His Field for 80-Bushel Beans

• Previous Fall Tillage: Disc ripped field with a John Deere 2700 ripper.
• Spring Pre-Emergent: Boundary and Authority worked in once with a field cultivator.
• Planted: May 2, 2020 at 160,000 seeds per acre
• Post-Planting Cultivation: Cultivated once and then once more around the outside.
• Post Spray: NONE [Casey added, “It still was our cleanest field even without the post spray.”]
• Foliar Applications: At third trifoliate, he applied a humic acid solution based on soil maps. (View video for in-depth discussion on specific products used and subsequent application passes.)