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| I did a test this summer in just a 1 sq meter area and cut of all the main top stems at V5 just after the auxiliary buds(flowers) developed. Plus at v5 the number of nodes is pretty much set.
You should have seen the difference, its like a super cropped the soybeans. They had almost double the pods as the ones a few rows over that were untouched. The amount of increased lateral branches vs not hurting the others was unreal.
This was in 15 inch rows, even.
Because main stem , or growing point, normally exhibits dominance over the axillary buds (axillary growing points) AKA flowers during vegetative growth of the plant.
If the main stem is severed or broken off along with part of the stem, however, the remaining axillary buds are released from this dominance and branches grow profusely.(And boy did they)
The plant, therefore, has the ability to produce new branches and leaves after my chopping. A well timed hail storm would would do the same thing at that growth stage will do the same things, as long as it doesnt break off the node below the cotyledon.
It the same thinking of when people spray cobra on them, but I think that is almost to harsh to the plant as a whole, thus the inconsistent results that I've seen over the year. Some saying rolling stresses it, but rolling them at V2 or V3 and stressing them seems like it might interfere with node development.
I plant to trial again this year, but do do each stage from V3 to V7 or 8. Also will plant a nonbush and bushy beans in the 30's to see if I can see any other advantages, and also mix around planting pop from 80,000 to 140,000. This past year was planted at 160,000.
This was really an exciting and intriguing experiment of potential in the future!
Edited by OSUBucks 3/18/2019 10:26
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Cutting off main stem of soybean at v5-v7--increased pods almost double
