High Speed Planting Soybean Study

Can you plant soybeans at higher speeds without sacrificing yield?

The speed at which you can plant is important because it will allow you to more effectively cover the acres per day needed to hit your planting window. As we’ve seen in other studies, like our soybean planting date study, hitting this window is vital to achieving your maximum yields and profit.

SpeedTube is a high-speed planting technology that takes the place of conventional seed tubes and consists of a flighted belt. By transporting each seed to the furrow, there is no opportunity for seeds to ricochet into the trench. Even at twice the normal planting speeds, seeds arrive safely at the bottom of the trench, spaced evenly, every time.

When we average data from 2022-2023, there was only a 0.1 Bu/A. range difference at planting speeds of 5MPH between the two systems. However, at 10MPH, SpeedTube proved additional yield gains of +2.25 Bu/A compared to a normal seed tube system.

In past years, we also have evaluated yield response at planting speeds of 4MPH, 6MPH, 8MPH, 10MPH, and even 12 MPH utilizing SpeedTube. In 2020, we saw a yield advantage of at least 0.9 Bu/A and 0.6 Bu/A at speeds of 8MPH and 10 MPH respectively. Yield started to decrease more significantly at speeds of 12MPH.

Our data suggests that growers can plant at significantly higher speeds with SpeedTube technology without sacrificing planter performance, making it more likely you can hit your ideal window for planting, which can lead to increased yield.

In-Depth Study Videos

Study Details 

Study data collected 2019-2023 at the PTI Farm in Pontiac, IL.