Ready or not, there’s a good chance dicamba-tolerant soybeans will be coming to a soybean field near you this year. Monsanto projects its Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans will be planted on more than 15 million acres in 2017, a big step up from 2 million to 3 million acres planted last year.

"Most of our customers are going to replace some of their older Roundup Ready 2 beans with Xtend soybeans," said John Cantwell, Monsanto technical services representative. The company intends to convert all of its soybeans to Xtend varieties, which offer resistance to both glyphosate and dicamba, within three years, he said.

The dicamba-tolerant soybeans and accompanying spray restrictions have been a hot topic at farm meetings all winter.

Three new dicamba formulations aimed at reducing off-target movement have been approved for use with the Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans. They...