MU Hundley-Whaley Field Day set for Sept. 5 in Albany

Tours on corn and soybean production, weed control, alternative crops, environmental quality and genetics will highlight the Hundley-Whaley Center Field Day, Sept. 5.

Tours begin at 8 a.m. and the last wagons load between 1 and 1:30 p.m. at the University of Missouri farm at the junction of South Birch and Orton streets on the southwest edge of Albany. United Electric Co-op will provide coffee, juice and rolls at registration. The Worth County Young Farmers will serve a free barbecue lunch at noon.

There will be five tours this year, said Don Null, University Extension and Outreach agronomist and research farm supervisor. Weed control research is featured on two of the tours. More than 50 industry representatives and MU researchers will make presentations.

Researchers at the farm continue to test new weed control products. “We’ll have some new herbicides on the corn tour,” Null said. “There are some new products that will come onto the market next year, and a couple of them look pretty darned good for soil-applied herbicides.”

The genetics tour is new this year, Null said. He expects to have nine or 10 speakers from seed companies that cooperate on the farm’s variety trials. They will talk about both corn and soybean genetics as well as what their companies are planning for the future. “We’ve given them each three to five minutes and told them not to make it a sales pitch, but something folks can take back home and think about when planning what to plant next year.”

Both the corn and soybean production tours include weed control stops. Both also include stops on variety testing and other areas. The soybean tour also will have stops on soybean maturities, row-width and plant population.

“The environmental quality tour will deal with everything from forestry management to filter strips,” Null said. It will also include stops on forages and soybean insects.

The alternative crops tour continues to grow. This year it will feature presenters and research from several universities and organizations. Alex Ching, from Northwest Missouri State University, Maryville, Mo., will talk about a variety of topics including black-eyed peas and the possibilities of using sweet sorghum for ethanol production. Keith Hawxby, MU Extension horticulture specialist, will talk about melon production.

MU agronomist Shawn Conley will discuss some of the sunflower research the Jefferson Institute has conducted at the farm this summer. “I’ll discuss all the sunflower options available as far as seed or oil are concerned,” Conley said. “I’ll touch a little on production and some of the pests that may become a problem. And I’ll also discuss a new web-based application to try to network growers and markets.”

As usual, farm machinery will be on display in the exhibit area.

The 300-acre MU center was made possible through the generosity of the Elma Hundley and Lulu Whaley estates. Research at the farm is supported financially by the Missouri Agriculture Experiment Station, the Missouri Soybean Merchandising Council, the Bonnie Clark Memorial Fund, and crop protection and seed companies. University Ourteach and Extension, The Hundley-Whaley Planning Committee, MU Agricultural Experiment Station, Extension Commercial Agriculture Program and area agribusinesses cooperate in sponsoring the field day.