Justin Ellgen, an intern with Pioneer Hi-Bred in Lawrence, spent most of Tuesday with four other workers hand-harvesting soybeans in the company's plot on the northern edge of Lawrence. Researchers with the company are determining which varieties of soybeans grow best in certain areas of Kansas and western Missouri.

When it comes to soybeans, good isn’t always good enough.

Researchers with Pioneer Hi-Bred are busy hand-harvesting soybeans from a research plot at the northern edge of Lawrence, hoping to gain clues for commercializing the next generation of high-yield, high-quality, drought-tolerant and pest-resistant beans.

“We’re seeing some positive signs,” said Travis Kriegshauser, senior research associate at the company’s Lawrence soybean research center, 1451 N. 1823 Road.

The seeds harvested on the company’s 50 acres in Douglas County will be cleaned, tested and judged against others from fields throughout Kansas and western Missouri, where thousands of varieties are being evaluated and adjusted to see what works best and where.

Lawrence became a hub for such efforts in 2007, when Pioneer Hi-Bred announced the launch of its local research efforts to develop and design varieties with tolerance to “yield robbers” such as drought, soybean cyst nematode, charcoal rot, stem borer, sudden death syndrome, Phytophthora root rot and other insect and disease-protection traits.

Last month, Pioneer Hi-Bred moved into its new research center, a two-building complex with responsibility for managing and overseeing research crops on dozens of acres throughout the state and western Missouri. The center is part of a $100 million plan to invest in Pioneer’s seed business.

Bill Wood, agriculture agent for K-State Research and Extension in Douglas County, welcomes the work of Kriegshauser, Pioneer colleague Les Kuhlman and others dedicated to helping area farmers make the most of their crops.

“Anytime you’ve got research going on in your specific area, your farmers are going to benefit from that,” Wood said. “They’ll find out what varieties work best, right here in Douglas County and for several counties around.”

The findings just might be worth a little more than a proverbial hill of beans: Last year, farmers reaped $10 million worth of soybeans in Douglas County, by averaging 27 bushels an acre. Boosting that yield by one bushel an acre would mean another $370,000 for farmers’ bank accounts.

Kriegshauser said that the Lawrence center’s efforts already were paying off, by gauging performance of seeds developed at other centers, while the value of other seed characteristics wouldn’t be known in the Lawrence area for another four or five years.