Forage Soybeans???

[OUBrew]

Listened to a podcast on forage soybeans from Eagle Seed Co. Interesting take but I'm wondering if it was all just sales pitch.

Anyone have any experience with them?

I appreciate the protein push the summer beans give but the main reason I love soybeans is for the late season. My biggest question is re: pod production in the forage beans.

[tim]

Good question. Seems the biggest factor would be they continue to grow even when heavily eaten by deer.

[OUBrew]

Tim...that is what they are saying...they almost stump sprout when browsed heavily. But I wondering if they put all their energy into resprouting leaves and leave nothing left to form pods.

[OUBrew]

Here's an article from the podcast guy...interesting read. Seems on the surface to be the perfect food plot choice...even for marginal soils. I would like to get some confirmation on pod production though...

https://www.droptinewildlife.com/articl ... pt2012.pdf

[tim]

Here's an article from the podcast guy...interesting read. Seems on the surface to be the perfect food plot choice...even for marginal soils. I would like to get some confirmation on pod production though...

https://www.droptinewildlife.com/articl ... pt2012.pdf

I would be interested in this as well

[OUBrew]

Here's an article from the podcast guy...interesting read. Seems on the surface to be the perfect food plot choice...even for marginal soils. I would like to get some confirmation on pod production though...

https://www.droptinewildlife.com/articl ... pt2012.pdf

I would be interested in this as well

Tim...I planted 14 acres of plots last year. Had some success with some and absolute failures with others. I will look at putting in a few acres of these forage beans and see how they end up. They are very expensive so it will be a slow start.

[EdC]

technically they are Indeterminate Soybeans

there must be other producers of this type of soybeans
need more research, someone must have them at a reasonable price

[lmurray1080]

Greetings Folks! I typically plant about 50-75 acres of soybeans for wildlife exclusively per year spread across multiple properties. I don't harvest these beans for any reason and over the past 3 years I have been drilling a winter blend of rye, oats, awnless variety of wheat and austrian winter peas. I am definitely not a soybean expert or farmer as I have got a lot of great knowledge from actual farmers that contribute to this site over the years. I will do my best to cover my personal experiences here in northern WV with our 45+ per square mile deer density and far way from any commercial soybean farmers. In a nutshell it has been my experience that what one plant is selected specifically for the plant will suffer equally in another department. Over the past 12 years or so I've planted (*free to me) leftover roundup ready soybean seed from both Agway and Pioneer in the 3-5 maturity range along with seed I paid retail for both roundup ready Realworld Wildlife Seed and Eagle Seed soybeans.

AG Seed
I started planting leftover soybean seed from farmer friends of mine that plant in Illinois and also Maryland. The seed was a year old with reduced germination rates and they had planned to throw it out so they gave it to me free of charge. The price was hard to beat and the seed germinated and grew very well however the entire field didn't get much taller than about 30"s plus matured at the exact same time causing the entire field to yellow down at once towards the end of summer. The first few years I planted these leftover Ag beans I was working with reduced acreage(1-3) and the deer were destroying them long before pod production and I was planting them using the broadcast method at about 100lbs per acre. As time went on I opened up more and more acreage to soybeans and began planting them with a drill which meant I could spread the seed farther and get better germination rates. I worked up to 10+ acres and drilled these Ag beans at about 50lbs per acre before I was able to observe pod production. These Ag beans threw on the pods for sure but it seamed what I came to know pod shattering became an issue. The AG beans are selected specifically for their ability to consistently mature at the precise time, throw on as many beans as possible, dry down and then the pods easily shatter to make harvesting easier. This shattering is tough as deer hunters because we want the pods above the snow line in late season(FEB-MAR) not lying on the ground rotting. I felt the AG beans also had only moderate ability to deal with deer browsing.

Eagle Seed Beans
I first started to hear about Eagle seed beans from listening to Grant Woods and also a friend who was a wildlife biologist. In our area it was extremely difficult to find any supplier of any type of roundup ready bean but we were able to find a supplier about 2 hour drive away. I planted eagle seed exclusively for about 3-4 years and was extremely pleased with their beans. They grew well and they also resisted browsing extremely well. I believe they use a combination of varying maturity soybeans which means that some of the field will begin to brown down but some plants will continue to grow. I honestly can't say anything bad about my experience other than from brief discussions on the phone to their seed sales team I was met with a very arrogant experience. I spoke to them about potentially becoming a dealer due to the difficult time getting seed close to where I am but I also had some questions that I would like to have had answered. The tone I received very much sounded like we are the greatest soybean company period, no other soybean provider knows what they are doing, you will pay exactly what we tell you, when we tell you and you will just deal with it if you want us to work with you plus please don't ask any questions. I will say that since that initial experience 8+ years ago I have been in contact recently with their distributor sales team and they were very pleasant and helpful. I will chalk that up to maybe a guy having a bad day. The main issue that I had as a working man was their pricing for soybeans kept creeping up and up and now for me to purchase a bag of eagle beans I'm looking at $175 per bag with shipping at my location. I thought overall Eagle Seed was great and produced a good amount of beans but not quite as much as traditional Ag Beans but produced more forage and grew later into the fall with some growing until first frost which continued to hold deer. The beans stayed in the pods much better than traditional Ag beans but not quite as good as Real World.


Real World Wildlife Seed
I stumbled across Real World Wildlife Seed about 5 years ago while looking for a potential alternative to Eagle Seed to save some money. I called up and actually spoke to Don Higgins who took about an hour to explain to me what they were working on and asked that I at least try a bag of his soybeans and plant it right next to Eagle Seed for comparison. I took him up on the offer and at that time needed to drive 3.5 hours one way to the closest distributor in Berlin, OH but at that time the price was only $50/bag vs $85/bag for Eagle. I did as Don requested and planted them side by side. In my honest opinion I couldn't tell a difference between the two from deer preference, browse resistance, amount of forage or seed quantity comparing them to Eagle Seed. Real World don't put on as many seed pods as traditional Ag beans in my opinion but really really close and all the additional forage and browse resistance throughout the summer more than makes up for it. it is also a huge benefit to have beans that grow later into the fall.

After my comparisons the decision was simple. I did and still continue to plant Real World Seed due to their ability to put on excellent forage, grow tall creating cover, putting on good seed quantity which is all similar to Eagle Seed but at half the cost. From strictly a hunting perspective I feel the cost to have beans growing later into the fall attracting deer is worth it. I also feel that having soybeans stay in the pods through early April providing some of the only forage available during that last couple early spring heavy snowfalls can make a huge difference in the overall health of your deer herd. The icing on the cake is my conversations I've had with Don Higgins and Kevin Boyer. They have both taken time to answer any questions I've had and never pressured me along or came across as a BS ridden salesman. On my first order through them Don drove 30 minutes out of his way to meet me at a parking lot personally delivering my seed and again took time to speak with me about his learned lessons from planting seed.

I have also heard that recently that Matt Dye from Land and Legacy who do great habitat work have been working with Stratton Seed to develop soybean seed and I believe I've heard they are selling it for $40-50 per 50lbs bag. Time and experience will tell if this variety will do the job but one things for sure if you're a working man selling something that performs as good or better for a better price will get attention and business quickly so you may want to look into that as well.

Good luck on your soybean plantings. In my opinion there is no better forage for heard health that growing soybeans that can produce and hold onto the beans until next planting season. Always remember when people sell their product's one or two key points they most likely had to take away from it equally somewhere else. Only other thing I will caution is if you live in a high deer density area and don't plan on fencing, I wouldn't plan on having beans if you only plant a few acres.

[lmurray1080]

Here are some pictures from last March. These are Real World Beans

[EdC]

thanks

[jman22]

I know a few people that also use Real World Beans and are happy with them. Don Higgins has a lot of info on the web about them.

[matt1336]

Beans on the stalk in March!? That’s awesome! Thanks for the write up. I have a friend that works for pioneer. I just sent him a text about forage beans

[OUBrew]

Here are some pictures from last March. These are Real World Beans

Great post! A lot of info from your experience and I had not heard of Real World beans. Don Higgins...I am assuming the two 200"+ guy from Illinois last year.

I will be planting 15 acres total this year over 2 different properties. I may give them all a try. I did this with Buck Forage Oates last year and ran them next to a blend from the seed company. BFO stayed green longer and the deer preferred them more after the first hard frost.

[isitseasonyet?]

I’ll be graduating with a degree in Crop and Weed Science from NDSU in May. You can get eagle seed beans which will produce more green tissue tonnage for early season eating. There are several different factors that make them desirable to deer. Better palatability, more protein, and increased sugar in the leaf tissue. Or you could buy a later maturing variety of “Ag” beans and have them stay green longer in the season.... of you are looking for the late season draw you either need to plant a large area, or fence them in. There is no other way for the plants to stand up to browsing pressure. This is EXTREMELY important when they are seedlings because if the deer eat them at that stage they will not recover. No mater what variety.

[OUBrew]

I’ll be graduating with a degree in Crop and Weed Science from NDSU in May. You can get eagle seed beans which will produce more green tissue tonnage for early season eating. There are several different factors that make them desirable to deer. Better palatability, more protein, and increased sugar in the leaf tissue. Or you could buy a later maturing variety of “Ag” beans and have them stay green longer in the season.... of you are looking for the late season draw you either need to plant a large area, or fence them in. There is no other way for the plants to stand up to browsing pressure. This is EXTREMELY important when they are seedlings because if the deer eat them at that stage they will not recover. No mater what variety.

The ag prodcution beans I put in last year made it to flowering stage and produced pods even though I screwed up and and did not innoculate the seed. I planted a 35 year fallow field. Beans only got a 16" high but had good pod numbers. The clear cut all around probably saved the beans early on but once it tuned cold and they moved in on the grain....the 5 acres was picked clean in under 2 weeks. Did not make the gun season little lone late season.

What are you hearing on pod development with Forage beans from Eagle?