Background

• Research conducted at the Carrington REC (Carrington) and the Oakes Irrigation Research Site (Oakes) in 2018 support yield benefits from planting soybeans early (early to second week of May), compared to normal (mid-May to about May 25) planting dates used a decade or more ago.
• Trials were established at Carrington under dryland and irrigated conditions and at Oakes under irrigation on three planting dates.

Results

• Soybean yields improved significantly from planting early under dryland in 2018 at Carrington (Figure 1). Under irrigation, yields were not different. 
• At Oakes, yields were greater for normal and early planted soybeans than late planting.

Figure 1. Soybean yields at three planting dates at Carrington and Oakes (2018).

Key Point:

• Planting soybean early is critical to maximizing yield. This was observed in our 2017 study and has been reported in other studies including this 2016 Center Points post by Greg Endres:  https://www.ag.ndsu.edu/carringtonrec/center-points/soybean-planting-date. Based on our results, planting in the second week of May will likely produce better yields than after May 14^th.

Jasper M. Teboh, Ph.D.
Jasper.Teboh@ndsu.edu
Research Soil Scientist