40 Years Ago
Tuesday, October 1, 2024
filed under: Historical
Excerpts from the October/November 1984 Issue of The Sunflower
Editor’s Note: The Sunflower’s 1994 publishing schedule did not include either an October or November issue. So our regular ’30 Years Ago’ page this month instead travels back 40 years, to the October/November 1984 issue of this magazine.
Sandy Soil, Aridity Demand Innovation / By Don Lilleboe — “Ed Hiza is probably one of the most unconventional sunflower producers in the United States. He needs to be, if he is to be successful.
“Hiza raises 4,000 acres of sunflower, much of it rented acreage, on the arid plains of southeastern Colorado, near Fowler. Except for a few acres of pinto beans, sunflower is his only crop. In an area where the wheat crop will probably fail one year out of three, and where pinto beans and sorghum are risky at best, Hiza has produced dryland sunflower yields of from 350 to 2, 000 pounds per acre.
“That’s not bad at all — particularly when you consider that his total precipitation averages 10 inches per year. (Two years ago, Hiza received a grand total of six inches of precipitation over a 20-month period.)
“Then there’s the sandy soil. And it is just that: deep sand. When it’s totally dry and there’s nothing to hold it together, the sand drifts with the wind. At other times it can become almost like concrete, defying the farmer’s attempts to break it.
“An ideal location for no-till crop production? Not really, says Hiza. The crops which would leave the most residue on the soil surface — wheat and sorghum — just aren’t going to yield decently in an average year. Proper activation of herbicides can present another obstacle. Sometimes there’s sufficient moisture for activation; sometimes there’s not. The sandy, dry soils have also resulted in some herbicide carryover problems.
“Hiza’s answer to it all is tillage — tillage to the tune of 3,500 tractor hours per year on his 4,000 acres.
“The program begins after harvest. Using a lister set on 50- to 60-inch centers, Hiza creates ridges to help control wind erosion and trap winter snows. He pulls the lister as deep as possible, with the result generally being a ridge peak that’s 16 to 18 inches above the bottom of the furrow.
“Tilling the sandy soils can be much more difficult than one might expect. ‘Many people think sand is easy to shuttle around — and at times it is. But at other times it sets up harder than adobe,’ Hiza comments. ‘I’ve had this sandy soil set up so hard and dry that chunks wouldn’t go between 22-inch chisels.
“While Hiza prefers to list, since it offers the best protection against wind erosion, he does have a couple other options. One is a cultivator with small shovels on 27- or 30-inch centers. The other is a parabolic (ripper) chisel: seven long, heavy shanks with V-shaped chisel points. The goal with the ripper is to pull up some clods of hardened soil to provide a certain amount of wind erosion protection until additional moisture arrives. But even this approach can be stymied by hard ground.”
Annual Midge Survey Reveals Good News / By Don Lilleboe — “Three years ago the sunflower midge was grabbing headlines all around the Red River Valley of eastern North Dakota, western Minnesota and southern Manitoba. This year it barely generated a footnote — much to the pleasure of the region’s sunflower producers.
“1984 was the fourth year in which entomologists from North Dakota State University, the University of Minnesota, South Dakota State University and Manitoba Agriculture have conducted a survey of midge infestation into the region’s sunflower fields.
“The good news is that in no area did the entomologists find midge populations of any significant proportions. ‘Frankly, if we were to indicate where we had midge damage in the sense of economic loss, we would have very few — if any — places on the entire map. I don’t think we came across a single field that had anything near an economic loss,’ says John Busacca, NDSU entomologist.
“NDSU entomologists have carried out a variety of midge-related research projects during the past few years. Many insecticides were tested, but none proved promising for the control of this hard-to-get-at pest.
“There has also been extensive screening of diverse collections of sunflower germplasm, inbred materials and hybrids in cooperation with USDA sunflower breeders. While nothing was found to be ‘resistant,’ there are certain materials — including a few hybrids already on the commercial market — which have displayed definite degrees of tolerance to the midge under light or moderate infestation levels.”
A Humorous Peek at Sunflower in the Cotton Belt — “Cotton is the dominant crop across a sizable portion of the West Texas Panhandle. Sunflower is still, in an average year, a minor crop within the area — generally accounting for somewhere in the vicinity of 25,-40,000 acres.
“That can change quickly, however, if the cotton crop gets hailed on. Then many of those cotton farmers plant sunflower as a ‘catch crop’ on hailed-out cotton ground. In 1982, to cite one example, the state’s sunflower acreage zoomed up to 250,000 acres — only to drop back to 35,-40,000 in 1983 and ’84.
“Cotton’s kingly status and sunflower’s ‘catch crop’ role for many of the Texas Panhandle’s cotton growers brings to mind the following humorous story, told a couple years ago by a cotton — and, occasionally, sunflower — grower from northwest of Lubbock.
“ ‘This farmer had been growing cotton for years and years, and he was in the same shape we are right now in West Texas: flat broke. He went to his banker to line up his business for another year, and his banker told him, “I’m not going to loan you another dime to plant cotton. You’ve broke yourself, and you’ve nearly broken me. But I will loan you the money to grow sunflower,” ’
“ ‘So the old boy thought about it for awhile and said, “Well, farming is all I know. I don’t like the idea at all, but I’m going to try it.” ’
“ ‘He did everything right, the weather was ideal, and nothing went wrong. He made the doggonedest sunflower crop you have ever seen. He harvested it, sold it, took the check to the bank, paid the banker and then went around town and squared up all his bills.”
“ ‘Finally he came back to his pickup with a roll of money big enough to choke a horse, and said to his wife, “Look here, honey. Now we can go plant cotton again!” ’