The Seed Is Worth More Than The Planter

I came across this post on Machinery Talk and that this was a very quotable post.

"The seed is worth more than the planter."

I am not sure I've ever done this but probably I have.  When I had six units full of $159 seed corn on a 40 year old White 5100 no till planter, I may have been coming close.

In recent years, when I put 30 bags of it in a $30,000 12 row planter I wasn't coming close.  I hope my planter was always worth more than I seed I  put into it, but that's a good question.  Is your planter worth more than the seed you put into it?

Whatever it costs, I need the best planter I can find that will do the job I need it to do.  That was a 1976 White 5100 planter, modified greatly.  That planter lasted me for years.  I should have kept it for a HyMark Ag Museum but I passed it on to another young farmer instead.  I needed a little bigger planter, an 8 row, a 12 row and last year we used a 24 row.  That was a little too big for this little guy.

I need the best seed I can find to put into it, that was First Choice and Porter corn hybrids.  Another group of friends are introducing Genesys Seeds where the farmer owns the company and controls the shots.  Whatever you choose, make sure it does the job you need it to do.  I am so amazed so many farmers buy so many traits I really don't think they need.  They get hooked on the salesman and the company he represents rather than the product that represents them.  Thankfully, I tested and tried every seed and trait known to man early on and learned they didn't have one thing over what I was already planting.

Yesterday I took delivery on some 40 year old genetics from my friend in Iowa.  Those pictures of soybean florets in my posts are now seed in my barn.  Dr. Richard Cooper developed them at OARDC for his 100 bushel soybean experiments in the 70's.  He bred semi-dwarf soybeans that would yield well and not fall down.  I need them to make at least 70% of what they made as seed for a good profit.  I don't forget those 100 bushel beans right beside 20 bu GMO fields.

That makes $1000 worth of seed in a $40,000 drill or planter for me.  I am not so concerned who made the planter as I am who bred the seed and who produced it.

I think there is a whole lot of unknown value of seed.  You can see the planter but you can't see inside the seed's history unless you look real hard.

Billions of dollars worth of seed is poised to go into the ground right now.

Is it really the best seed for that farmer or has he been lead down the path of the machinery salesman?

Ed