Farmers can consider seeding an annual forage crop after their winter wheat, says a Purdue Extension forage specialist. In Indiana, farmers typically seed a late crop of soybean after harvesting winter wheat, but sometimes, especially in the northern part of the state, the growing season is not long enough to accommodate both crops, Keith Johnson said. Carefully selected forage crops, which can be used for silage, hay and livestock grazing, are able to produce vegetative growth for harvest before the growing season ends.

Now is the time when corn diseases begin to appear and it’s important to become familiar with the symptoms in your fields. With the recent dry spells in many areas, the incidence of foliar diseases may be slowed, however, when wet weather does return, it is likely that many foliar diseases will begin appear quickly.

As alfalfa growers hit the fields, now is an important time to be on the lookout for potato leafhoppers (PLH). This is the pest most affecting alfalfa production in the central United States, causing devastating effects to alfalfa leaves and stunting plant growth.

Growing conditions determine fiber digestibility, and the right combination of weather conditions make for an optimum silage crop, say experts at Pioneer Hi-Bred, a DuPont business.

Updated June 23, 2011 Instead of hauling one or two bales at a time with his tractor, David Anderson used his brain to save time.

Very wet spring conditions have made it almost impossible to spread manure in April and much of May, and some of what was spread would have been better remaining in storage – that is unless, like many, storage was about to overflow.