As a land owner for 6 years now, at 25% share and 240 cultivated acres, my experience is that finding a farmer who will do a soil test every year or two and add any nutrients AT ALL is very difficult. The present one (on a 5 year contract) was told that the farm had zero nutrients added for the two prior years. He waited until after harvest of year 4 (2020) and then wanted assurance from me he would get a 6th year before adding anything. This seems to be the biggest problem to overcome with farm land ownership. With my next contract, I will take control of that by going 30% but in exchange I will have the soil test done, (80 acres per year) and spend at least $7,000 on nutrients and provide proof of it including notification of the day the nutrients will be added. So, every 3rd year 1/3 of the farm will have $7,000 of nutrients. I am not sure yet how difficult it will be to find a farmer to agree to that but anyone who balks, 5.00% of the 240 acres is right at $7,000 anyway, so they probably would also neglect the inputs.
Thanks for the question! Our state soil fertility recommendations do not change based on the seed brand or variety. The research in the video includes multiple varieties and multiple brands of seed.
As a land owner for 6 years now, at 25% share and 240 cultivated acres, my experience is that finding a farmer who will do a soil test every year or two and add any nutrients AT ALL is very difficult. The present one (on a 5 year contract) was told that the farm had zero nutrients added for the two prior years. He waited until after harvest of year 4 (2020) and then wanted assurance from me he would get a 6th year before adding anything. This seems to be the biggest problem to overcome with farm land ownership. With my next contract, I will take control of that by going 30% but in exchange I will have the soil test done, (80 acres per year) and spend at least $7,000 on nutrients and provide proof of it including notification of the day the nutrients will be added. So, every 3rd year 1/3 of the farm will have $7,000 of nutrients. I am not sure yet how difficult it will be to find a farmer to agree to that but anyone who balks, 5.00% of the 240 acres is right at $7,000 anyway, so they probably would also neglect the inputs.
Does this apply to different variety of seed or brand of seed? Or does this apply to any brand or variety?
Thanks for the question! Our state soil fertility recommendations do not change based on the seed brand or variety. The research in the video includes multiple varieties and multiple brands of seed.