Stand Evaluation and Replant Decisions

Emergence is a critical time to be out scouting and evaluating your stands to ensure your soybeans are set up for success. In this video, Pioneer Field Agronomist John Schoenhals provides some guidance on things to look out for when you’re scouting your soybean fields evaluating soybean emergence and stands. Singularity and uniform emergence is important, so making sure to apply fungicide where needed, scout for pest and disease pressure, and keeping an eye out for injury from pre-emergence herbicide. When evaluating stands, make sure to check soybean auxiliary buds for frost damage. John also shows you a quick way to count plants to get stand estimates. He also gives replant guidelines, as soybeans are more resilient to stand loss than other crops.

As corn emerges, take time to evaluate corn stands. This involves taking stand counts and visually assessing seedlings to see growth and development appears normal. Pioneer Field Agronomist Paul Yoder discusses potential causes of poor or uneven stands. An uneven stand will yield less than a relatively even stand with the same number of plants. Plants that are severely injured or defoliated will have reduced photosynthetic capability and a lower yield potential.

Pioneer Field Agronomist Paul Yoder discusses things farmers should consider when scouting corn and soybeans early in the growing season. To determine a plant stand for row crops, take several sample counts to represent the field or or area under consideration. For ease of calculation, a sample size of 1/1,000th of an acre is recommended. Measure off the distance appropriate for your row width; count the number of live plants and multiply by 10,00 to obtain a reasonable estimate of plants/acre.

Pioneer Field Agronomist Ron Joiner walks viewers early season plant stand assessment. To determine a plant stand for row crops, take several sample counts to represent the field or area under consideration. For ease of calculation, a sample size of 1/1,000th of an acre is recommended. Measure off the distance appropriate for your row width; count the number of live plants and multiply by 10,00 to obtain a reasonable estimate of plants/acre. Growers should also pay attention to Stand uniformity and plant health. An uneven stand will yield less than a relatively even stand with the same number of plants. Plants that are severely injured or defoliated will have reduced photosynthetic capability and a lower yield potential.

After corn emergence, it's important to complete stand evaluations to check for any issues to make the right management decisions to maximize your yield potential. In this video, Pioneer Field Agronomist Ryan Bates shows you what he looks for when he is out in the field completing a corn stand evaluation. Some things he encourages you to look for is uniform emergence, make a stand count, look at the spacing and planter performance, and dig seeds up to look at seed depth. Performing these evaluations are important to guide any replant decisions, as well as evaluate performance to make changes and improvements for next year.

Pioneer Field Agronomist Derek Bowman shows you how he evaluates corn emergence. When it comes to emergence, Derek evaluates plants based on three factors: overall stand establishment, stand uniformity, and early growth vigor. He also shows you how to growth stage your crop as well. Derek will also show you a real example of corn emergence in a field, and go step by step as he evaluates emergence in the field. He visually assesses stand establishment in the field using a rating system, and show you how to do it in your field. When it comes to stand uniformity, he stresses the importance of having corn growing at the same rate, and the effect of having runt plants on your overall yield. And then finally he examines growth vigor, detailing the difference between vigor and stress emergence, and then how he measures early growth vigor in the example field.