• Disease
• Insect
• Weed
• Seeds

The optimal corn population for any situation will depend on the anticipated environment and how the hybrid responds to that environment. Producers can look back to their corn crop from the previous growing season, or wait until the current growing season is nearly complete, and evaluate whether the population they used was adequate.

Individual hybrids can respond differently, but the following guidelines may help in deciding if current seeding rates need to be adjusted. If more than about 5% of the plants are barren or if most ears have fewer than 350 kernels per ear, the population may be too high. If there are consistently more than 500 kernels per ear or if most plants have a second ear contributing significantly to grain yield, the population may be too low. Of course the growing conditions will influence ear number and ear size as well, so it is important to factor in the growing conditions for that season when interpreting these plant responses.

Don’t be too concerned if a half-inch or so of the ear tip has no kernels. If kernels have formed to the tip of the ear, there may have been room in that field for more plants contributing to grain yield. Again, "tipping back" will vary with individual hybrids and with growing conditions. Potential ear size is set well before silking and the actual final number of kernels is not determined until after pollination and early grain fill.

Always keep the long-term weather conditions in mind. The drought that affected much of Kansas in 2011 and 2012 made almost any population too high for the available moisture in some areas. Although it’s not a good idea to make significant changes to seeding rates based only on what happened recently, it is worthwhile taking into consideration how much moisture there is in the soil profile and the long-term forecasts for the upcoming growing season.

Making a decision on whether to keep seeding rates at your usual level or cutting back somewhat this year if the soil profile is drier than normal is a little like the famous line in the movie Dirty Harry:

“How lucky do you feel?” If you think weather conditions will be more favorable for corn this year 2 than the past two years, stay about in the middle to upper part of the range of seeding rates in the table below. If you do not think growing conditions will improve enough to make up for dry subsoils, you might want to consider going toward the lower end of the range of recommended seeding rates, with the caveat that if growing conditions improve you will have limited your top-end yield potential.

Optimal seeding rates may need to be adjusted for irrigated corn if fertilizer or irrigation rates are sharply increased or decreased. For example, research at the Irrigation Experiment Field near Scandia has shown that if fertilizer rates are increased, seeding rates also have to be increased to realize the maximum yield benefit. Consult seed company recommendations to determine if seeding rates for specific hybrids should be at the lower or upper end of the recommended ranges for a given environment.

click image to zoom The recommended planting rates in the following table attempt to factor in these types of questions for the typical corn growing environments found in Kansas. Adjust within the recommended ranges depending on the specific conditions you expect to face and the hybrid you plan to use.

The following recommend planting rates are from the K-State Corn Production Handbook.

For more information, see the K-State Corn Production Handbook, C-560: http://www.ksre.ksu.edu/library/crpsl2/c560.pdf

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