Residue Management for Soybean Establishment in No-Till Crop Systems.

Producers can have difficulty planting soybean into corn residue following high corn yields with large amounts of residue.  We conducted a study to see whether removing or chopping corn residue would affect yields of tilled or no-till soybean. The study included 38- and 76-cm rows to see if residue would interact with row spacing. The study was conducted in 2012 and 2013 at three Illinois sites: Dixon Springs, Brownstown, and Urbana.  Residue was left undisturbed (standing), was chopped and left in the field, or was removed.  All locations were affected by dry weather during the summer of 2012.  At Urbana, no-till yielded 269 kg ha^-1 less than tilled plots, and 38-cm rows yielded 114 kg ha^-1 more than 76-cm rows.  Lower yields were observed when residue was left standing followed by no-till in both row spacings.  When residue was removed, no-till yielded more than tillage in 38-cm rows but less than tillage in 76-cm rows.  At Brownstown, residue removal yielded 115 kg ha^-1 less than chopped residue remaining on the plots and 198 kg ha^-1 less than standing residue remaining on the plots.  At Dixon Springs, there was no effect of residue treatment, tillage, row spacing, or any of these interactions on yield.  The effect of residue management was not consistent across sites, and there was not a strong indication that corn residue has a large effect on the following soybean crop.