Courtneys side dress, apply micronutrients to corn

Drew Courtney designed and created a side dresser.

This shows the coulter unit, as it cuts a slit in the soil. The injection nozzle emits a stream of the liquid 28 fertilizer 2 inches into the ground right behind the coulter.

Drew Courtney was out spraying and side dressing last week in the corn fields.

OAKES, N.D. – The corn and most of the soybeans are flourishing at the Courtney farm.

"We are really happy with the conditions we are working in," said Drew Courtney, who farms with his wife, Lindsey, and his cousin, Kyle and Kyle's wife, Megan.

"The early corn looks the best and the corn we tried to put in between rain showers is not quite as good, but we are still happy with what we have considering the challenges with seeding," he said.

Drew has been busy with spraying and side dressing now that seeding is finished.

"I’m in the tractor putting liquid 28 percent fertilizer between the rows. In addition, on the side dress, we are spraying micronutrients on the corn rows," Drew said. "That way we get a direct hit to the plant leaves to minimize over spraying and waste."

Drew modified an existing side dresser to be able to apply foliar micronutrient to the leaves of the corn while he is applying nitrogen fertilizer between the rows of corn at the same time.

In the past, the Courtneys would go through the field twice to complete both spraying operations.

"Then, we custom built a sprayer system, so we can spray both in one pass causing less stand damage, saving time and money with one less trip across the field in an implement," he said.

The side dresser is called a Fast side dresser. On the tool bar, they built the sprayer system.

"We put saddle tanks on the tractor with a separate pump so we can apply foliar micronutrients while we are doing our side dressing," Drew said. "It is a lot more concentrated applying it right on the plant."

Drew uses twin fan nozzles for the spraying operations.

"It sprays forward and backward so it gets really good coverage," he said.

The coulter unit cuts a slit in the soil.

"It has an injection nozzle that emits a stream of the liquid 28 fertilizer 2 inches into the ground right behind the coulter," he said.

The weather has been nice and sunny this week at the farm. On Monday June 13, a rainstorm with strong winds that gusted more than 60 mph came through the county.

"We were about 20 miles from the worst part of the wind. If you get over to Ellendale, located to the west of us, people lost grain bins, and the city lost trees and buildings," Drew said. "We did have some land over there that had some larger trees that tipped over on the road and we had to move them before we could get over there to spray. Kyle is finishing up our corn spraying over there now."

The Courtneys finished seeding soybeans on June 6.

The forecast is for intense heat this weekend, with temperatures into the 90s.

"It is supposed to be 102 degrees on Sunday. We are a little nervous about the soybeans that were smeared in and hope the soil doesn't crust. Crusting could cause problems," he said, "but I think everything will be fine."

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