Kent's Korner for June 1999

TSM Logo June 1999

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Kent's Korner

By Kent Durbin, President
TSM Services, Inc.

What started out around here as everyone thinking our season was going to be very late, has realized that we are having a rather good planting season. All the corn went in prior to the 10th of May with rains to give it a good start. Soybeans were 80% planted as of the last week of May. Our Catlin Research Farm looks as good as I have seen it. Unless something unexpected happens, we will be having several training sessions this summer.

Our crop year (July 1 through June 30) finds our business down somewhat. At the end of December, we were equal with last year. With the rains keeping us wet up through parts of April, when the dry weather got here, growers went immediately to planting. This left our spring business short of a year ago. We suspect that this business that we missed this spring will show up this fall so our expectations are that we will have a better fall coming up.

We have spent a lot of time and money researching the difference between budgets A (higher cost budget), E (MEY or maximum economic yield) and I (lower cost budget). This research should be essential when you are talking with growers on how they can cut cost during less attractive seasons. The real question is "How can you cut cost and maintain a higher yield?" The answer is not to drop fertilizer altogether, as some did. The answer is to drop your budget (to an "F","G" or "H" budget) during the less attractive periods and return to the "E" budget later. Remind your growers of this research. If you need copies of this research, just contact Dr. Randy Simonson in the Catlin office.

TSM® continues to finds ways to improve the Total Soil Management® program. The new product "TSM1" is now in the third phase of the research we do before we recommend a product for full use in the Total Soil Management® program.

Phase one: to put the product on the Catlin Research facility in our "prospective" plots.
Phase two: if the product shows well in phase one, we will put it under replicated plots on the Catlin Research Farm.
Phase three: if the product looks good in the prospective plots (phase one), shows good results in replicated plots (phase two) then we will take it to the farm for "on-farm" testing (phase three).

The anticipated acceptance to these "on-farm" plots was greater than we expected. We have many "on-farm" plots covering grains, vegetable and fruit crops. We should be able to make a good evaluation after the results are in. If these results are good, we will initiate phase four, which is to recommend full-scale use of the product. TSM1 will be an exclusive to all TSM® dealerships. This was the first product that we have found, in many years of testing, that made it past phase two.

I am in the process of corresponding with manure processing companies to see if we can establish a product capable of being blended with commercial fertilizers. There is an increased interest in processing manure. When these factories come on board, they will be competitors to our fertilizer dealers. There is composting, cooking, pelletizing raw manure and oxidation as examples of these methods of processing manure. I want to create a processed product that our TSM® dealers can put through the Total Soil Management® program and make as much (or more) as they do selling commercial fertilizer. This is starting to develop and I feel we will have such a product and program within this coming crop year. If you are interested in cooperating in this program, call me. This looks exciting to me.

There will be some small cost changes come July 1. Remember that the "per acre" charge goes up 5 cents July 1, 1999. July of 1997 we initiated a program to increase the "per acre" charge 25 cents over a 4-year period. On July 1, 1997 the cost went up 10 cents per acre. On July 1, 1998 the cost went up 5 cents per acre. The cost will increase by 5 cents on July 1, 1999 and again on July 1,2000. This will achieve our needed increase. We felt that doing this on a 4-year schedule was better than making a 25 cents increase all at once.

Another small change will be in the area of UPS charges. Some dealers want an up-date after every additional group of samples comes through our office and additional up-dates as revisions come through. Other dealers ask for just one grower notebook after all the samples are done. Our recommendation is that you use whichever method you like; however, we will charge you for the postage. If you want an up-date each time, this is fine.

Another small change is that TSM® Dinnerware will become a part of the "Dollar Matching Fund". This really is not an increased cost since very few dealers spent 100% of their matching fund monies. Take advantage of this matching dollar fund because it cuts your cost in half for promotion and advertising.