PTI farm ready for another season

PONTIAC – Preparations are ongoing for another season at the Precision Planting PTI research farm at Pontiac.

Corn and soybean plant date studies are already underway at the 400-acre farm on the west side of town even though a low percentage of acres have been planted so far.

“We were able to do our first planting on April 3,” explained Precision Planting’s Jason Webster.

A few soybeans planted that day are starting to peak through the ground although the corn has a ways to go since temperatures have been cool during April. Webster discovered some corn hybrids have very low saturated cold germ scores.

“We put some of those low germ hybrids in just to see how they would perform in that type of environment then we’ll plant them again once it warms up.”

Around 100 trials are featured on the research farm and Webster is excited for the wet weather to pass to get back into the field.

There is a new 20,000 square foot building under construction on the grounds which will include multi-purpose classrooms, office space, technical training and a shop area. This facility, which should be completed by late summer, will allow Precision Planting to host events at the farm year-round.

The idea behind the PTI farm is to do things a bit differently in an effort to increase yields and make growers more profitable.

Precision Planting has launched a new video series known as “Inside PTI” which includes two agronomic videos released each week online.

“I laugh every time I hear a Precision Planting dealer or farmer tell me, ‘I just want you to tell the story of what happened in those plots – I don’t want to read it, I just want to see you on video talking about it,’” said Webster.

Growers can sign up for the video series by visiting www.insidepti.com and look for new sessions each Tuesday and Thursday.