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Enhanced OMAFRA Extension Support (2023)

Principal Investigator: Ben Rosser, Horst Bohner and Joanna Follings

Research Institution: Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs

Timeline: January 2023 – December 2023  

Objectives:

  • Enhanced tech transfer efforts through upgrades to websites, apps, videos, YouTube segments, PowerPoint presentations and print publications. Technology transfer will also be improved through the support of field diagnostic and plot day activities. Southwest Diagnostic Days, FarmSmart Expo, and the Eastern Diagnostic Days are excellent examples of “hands on learning” for farmers and agronomists.
  • Improved information gathering through the investigation of new management techniques (producer driven) or new developments in products or processes (agricultural industry driven). This would include searching out innovative practices abroad, identifying key players and bringing them to speak at Ontario meetings. Conducting searches of scientific literature, government publications and web-based materials to ensure a “state-of-the-art” position when formulating research proposals, writing extension articles, or interpreting Ontario data. Proper information gathering is essential to inform government policy to ensure practical solutions are created for Ontario farmers.
  • Breaking issues support throughout the growing season as challenges arise. Labour, travel, and lab costs associated with issues that develop (e.g., soil nitrate testing when weather is unusual, soybean pest scouting, gathering and testing of samples to monitor Fusarium levels in wheat or corn, wheat leaf disease surveys).

Impacts:

  • Ensure the ongoing competitiveness and sustainability of the Ontario grain sector through extension and technology transfer.
  • Information provided to farmers and agronomists allows them to make the best management decisions possible in a particular growing season.

Scientific Summary:

Ben Rosser (Corn)

1. Ad-Hoc Projects

Extension funding paid for video editing services to create videos on various topics for Ontario’s field crop producers. These videos covered topics including cover crops, compaction, case studies of no-till and reduced till producer experiences, and producer viewpoints on replacing seeding equipment. Some of these videos were shown at the Outdoor Farm Show and Ontario Ag Conference with the remaining videos to be posted to Field Crop News YouTube Channel.

2. Recommendations to Producers

In years of well above normal in-season rainfall, there are often questions on whether additional nitrogen (N) should be applied to cover losses that might have occurred. If leaching is the loss of concern, very excessive amounts of rainfall are required to move N below the root zone once in-season when corn crop water use is high and the soil profile is already dried (e.g., late June through to September). Growers are cautioned to avoid automatic reactions to apply extra N for this purpose. At the Ridgetown leaching experiment, 6” of rain was not enough to leach nitrates below 3’. This may be different on heavier soils where denitrification is more of a concern (e.g., heavier, poorly drained, or poorly structured soils), or earlier in season (e.g., May-June) when soil water content may be higher and crop water usage lower.

Horst Bohner (Soybean)

1. Can early planting and longer maturing varieties (higher maturity group (MG)) improve wide row soybean performance?

Purpose: Some growers have moved away from seed drills to planters due to lower seeding costs, less white mould, and better emergence. In Ontario, wide rows are known to have slightly lower yields. The yield reduction is due to slower canopy closure, which reduces the amount of sunlight intercepted by the crop. For maximum yield potential, 95% light interception must occur by early pod set. To minimize the reduction in light interception, longer maturity group varieties (higher CHU’s) can be planted. These varieties mature later in the fall, allowing additional time to “catch up” and use more of the growing season’s sunlight. The trials evaluated the performance of four varieties with different maturities in 15” and 30” rows. To determine if the yield gap of wide rows could be minimized, two planting days were evaluated.

Results: In 2022 and 2023, 6 trials were seeded. The results are averaged from three different sites (Tables 1 & 2). Wide rows (30”) performed well at each site, but depending on the variety, wide rows yielded 2.0 to 9.6 bu/ac less than 15” rows. The yield reduction was similar for both planting dates. Late planting into wide rows had the worst performance, leading to the conclusion that early planting alone cannot overcome the yield loss associated with wide rows. In 2022, a trend appeared with shorter maturity group (MG) varieties suffering the greatest yield reductions (see Table 1). Careful variety selection is essential if planting into 30” rows. A longer MG variety appears to be a better fit to 30” rows, although MG is not the only criteria for variety selection. “Bushy” varieties should also be considered for wide row planting as they fill in the canopy quicker.

Table 1. 2022 soybean yields when planted in 15” and 30” rows

   VarietyRow WidthMaturity Group (CHU)Seeding* RatePlanting DateYield bu/acLoss to 30″ Rows (bu/ac)
1Viper R2X15″0.8 (2725)165Early75.7 
2Viper R2X30″0.8 (2725)140Early69.5-6.2
3Harrier E315″1.3 (2850)165Early75.2 
4Harrier E330″1.3 (2850)140Early70.0-5.2
5Cyclone R2X15″1.5 (2900)165Early75.2 
6Cyclone R2X30″1.5 (2900140Early71.9-3.3
7Cougar E315″1.7 (2950)165Early73.9 
8Cougar E330″1.7 (2950)140Early71.9-2.0
9Viper R2X15″0.8 (2725)165Late71.7 
10Viper R2X30″0.8 (2725)140Late65.6-6.1
11Harrier E315″1.3 (2850)165Late68.5 
12Harrier E330″1.3 (2850)140Late65.5-3.0
13Cyclone R2X15″1.5 (2900)165Late71.3 
14Cyclone R2X30″1.5 (2900140Late67.5-3.8
15Cougar E315″1.7 (2950)165Late70.3 
16Cougar E330″1.7 (2950)140Late67.6-2.7

*Seeding rates were 165 000 and 140 000 seeds/ac. Early planting date = May 7-11. Late = May 30-June 2. Yields are averaged across 3 site locations. Each location was replicated 3-4 times. LSD = 2.2 bu/ac.

Table 2. 2023 soybean yields when planted in 15” and 30” rows

   VarietyRow WidthMaturity Group (CHU)Seeding* RatePlanting DateYield bu/acLoss to 30″ Rows (bu/ac)
1Viper R2X15″0.8 (2725)165Early80.8 
2Viper R2X30″0.8 (2725)140Early76.6-4.2
3Falcon E315″1.3 (2850)165Early68.7 
4Falcon E330″1.3 (2850)140Early65.9-2.8
5Avalanche XF15″1.4 (2875)165Early73.5 
6Avalanche XF30″1.4 (2875140Early70.1-3.4
7Typhoon E315″1.6 (2925)165Early72.3 
8Typhoon E330″1.6 (2925)140Early68.0-4.3
9Viper R2X15″0.8 (2725)165Late79.6 
10Viper R2X30″0.8 (2725)140Late77.3-2.3
11Falcon E315″1.3 (2850)165Late68.0 
12Falcon E330″1.3 (2850)140Late58.4-9.6
13Avalanche XF15″1.4 (2875)165Late70.7 
14Avalanche XF30″1.4 (2875140Late62.9-7.8
15Typhoon E315″1.6 (2925)165Late62.4 
16Typhoon E330″1.6 (2925)140Late58.9-3.5

*Seeding rates were 165 000 and 140 000 seeds/ac. Early planting date = May 11-16. Late = May 30-June 1. Yields are averaged across 3 site locations. Each location was replicated 3-4 times. LSD = 2.2 bu/ac.

Summary:

  • Proper variety selection is important when growing wide row (30”) soybeans.
  • The yield loss associated with wide rows can be reduce by early planting. Early planting allows the plants to have a longer period to fill in the rows.
  • In the trials conducted, each variety in 30” rows yielded less when compared to 15” rows, so no strategy eliminated the yield lag associated with wide rows.
  • Averaged across all varieties, early planting did not eliminate the yield penalty associated with wide rows.
  • In 2022, longer maturing varieties showed a smaller yield reduction compared to shorter maturing varieties.

2. Both sulphur (S) and nitrogen (N) are essential nutrients necessary for plant growth. Does the addition of sulphur (S) or nitrogen (N) improve soybean yields on clay loam or silt soils?

Purpose: In the past, it was assumed that the soil supplied adequate amounts of S to meet soybeans’ full yield potential. Since air-borne S emissions have been drastically reduced in the Great Lake Basin, is it now necessary to supply soybeans with additional S? Much like N, S moves quickly in the soil and can be rapidly depleted, even if soil levels were adequate in previous years. A major challenge in determining the need for S fertilizer is that soil tests for S are unreliable. To add to this challenge, S deficiency symptoms are not obvious in soybeans. Soybeans remove relatively little S in comparison to crops such as canola or corn. For a 50 bu/ac crop of soybeans, only 5 lbs/ac of S is removed. Meanwhile, canola removes 15 lbs/ac and corn removes approximately 10 lbs/ac.

Similar to S, N fertilizer is generally not applied to soybeans since the plant fixes atmospheric nitrogen through biological N fixation. However, in recent years some growers have reported yield gains from the addition of N fertilizer. This could be due to the large amount of corn residue left on the surface in no-till production or simply the higher soybean yields many growers have been able to achieve in recent years. 

In this study both the addition of S and N were tested. Since S fertilizers usually contain another element such as N it is difficult to assess S as a single element using readily available commercial fertilizer. For example ammonium sulphate (AMS) has a nutrient analysis of 21-0-0-24S. In this set of trials, N was applied in the form of urea (46-0-0) at a rate of 40 lbs/ac of actual N as one treatment. As a separate treatment AMS (21-0-0-24) was tested at a rate of 10 lb/acre of actual S blended with urea to achieve 40 lbs/ac of actual N. With these additive treatments it was possible to assess if either nutrient impacted yield. In other words the check treatment comparison for the S (AMS fertilizer) was the N (urea) treatment. The check treatment for the N was a completely untreated check (no fertilizer).

Results: In 2023, three trials were conducted in both 15” and 30” rows to assess the yield benefits on soybeans associated with a N application (pre-plant urea) or a urea/AMS pre-plant blend. Trial sites were located near Stratford (clay loam), Elora (silt loam), and Winchester (clay loam). The variety used in the trials was Viper R2X. When comparing N to the untreated control (no fertilizer) in the same row width, only the 30” rows at the late planting date showed a yield gain (2.7 bu/ac). The yield gain could be explained by a quicker canopy closure due to the N. Additional yield was not provided by the S in the urea/AMS blend over the straight urea application. (Table 3). This clearly showed that N provided some benefit, but S did not add to yield.

Table 3. Soybean response to N and a N/AMS blend

   Row WidthTreatment*Seeding RatePlanting** DateYield bu/ac  Yield Gain (bu/ac)
115″ Untreated165Early80.7 
230″Untreated140Early76.6
315″N165Early80.70
430″N140Early76.2– 0.4
515″N + AMS165Early79.6– 1.1
630″N + AMS140Early76.8 0.2
715″ Untreated165Late75.5 
830″ Untreated140Late70.6
915″N165Late74.0– 1.5
1030″N140Late73.3 2.7
1115″N + AMS165Late75.3– 0.2
1230″N + AMS140Late73.7 3.1

*N = 87 lbs/ac (40 lbs/ac actual N) of urea broadcast pre-plant.

Urea/AMS = 68 lbs/ac urea + 42 lbs/ac AMS (40 actual N and 10 actual S lbs/ac) LSD = 1.9 bu/ac.

**Early = the first planting window when the soil was fit (May 11-16). Late = (May 30 – June 1).

Summary:

  • In 2023, three trials compared a preplant application of 87 lbs/ac urea and a 110 lbs/ac urea/AMS blend to untreated soybeans.
  • On 30” rows in a late planting window, the application of pre-plant urea had a small increase on yield (2.7 bu/ac).
  • On these clay-loam and silt loam soils, the application of S had no significant increase on yield. It should be noted that in other Ontario trials, S has been shown to provide yield gains on coarse textured sandy soils (data not shown).

3. Can the yield loss associated with wide rows be “won back” with the addition of starter N and foliar fungicides?

Purpose: Seed costs and white mould pressure can be reduced with 30” rows, but wider rows are known to yield less. The main reason why 30” rows yield less is due to the slower canopy closure. Starter N and foliar fungicides can help to reduce the yield loss associated with wide rows. Starter N aids in “filling” the canopy faster. The application of foliar fungicides can aid to keep the canopy healthy. Therefore, wide rows may be more responsive to inputs such as starter N and foliar fungicides. In 2023, at planting time, 87 lbs/ac of urea was broadcasted. The foliar fungicide applied was DELARO Complete and was applied at growth stage R2.5.

Picture 1: June 30, 2022. Tavistock, ON. The larger rows on the right side of the picture received 10 gallons of 28% N. These rows were darker green in colour and filled the canopy faster.

Results: In 2022 and 2023, six trials were conducted in Tavistock, Stratford, Elora, and Winchester (Table 4). The variety used in the trials was Viper R2X. The yield loss associated with wide rows could largely be “won back” with a combination of starter N fertilizer and a foliar fungicide. The untreated 30” rows planted in early May yielded 74.3 bu/ac. With the application of starter N and foliar fungicide, the yield increased to 76.7 bu/ac. The untreated 15” rows planted in early May yielded 78.0 bu/ac, but with addition of starter N and foliar fungicides increased yield to 80.4 bu/ac. The June planting date had similar results, although the overall yield potential was reduced compared to the early May planting date. Most of the yield gain was from the foliar fungicide, not the starter N. Early planting is an important factor with wide rows. Wide rows can perform well, but 15” rows still have a yield advantage over 30” rows. This study does not suggest that wide rows are more responsive to the inputs tested; although the inputs increased the yield in 30” rows, they also increased yield in the 15” rows.

Table 4. Soybean response to starter N and foliar fungicides

   Row WidthTreatment*Seeding RatePlanting** DateYield bu/ac  Loss of 30” rows Compared to 15” Untreated (bu/ac)
115″ Untreated165Early May78.0 
230″Untreated140Early May74.3– 3.7
315″N165Early May78.4
430″N140Early May74.9– 3.1
515″N + Fungicide165Early May80.4
630″N + Fungicide140Early May76.7– 1.3
715″ Untreated165Late May73.4 
830″ Untreated140Late May69.1– 4.3 
915″N165Late May72.8
1030″N140Late May70.6– 2.8
1115″N + Fungicide165Late May76.7
1230″N + Fungicide140Late May71.2– 2.2

*N = 10 gallons/ac of 28% UAN applied on soil surface at planting streamed on the row in 2022. 87 lbs/ac of urea broadcast in 2023. Fungicide = DELARO Complete at growth stage R2.5.

**Early May = the first planting window when the soil was fit. (May 7-16) Late May = (May 30 – June 2).

Summary:

  • Yield losses associated with 30” rows can be mitigated with the use of starter N, foliar fungicides, and early planting.
  • Starter N fertilizer and the application of a foliar fungicide reduced the yield gap of 30” rows to only 1.3 bu/ac for the first planting date. The yield gap was reduced by 2.2 bu/ac for the second planting date.

Grower Recommendations (from the above three studies):

  • The yield loss when planting soybean in 30” rows compared to 15” rows could not be completely overcome with various management strategies. However, there was a trend showing that shorter maturity group (MG) varieties suffered the greatest yield reductions. This suggests that careful variety selection is essential if planting in 30” rows.
  • Some of the yield loss associated with wide rows could be “won back” with a combination of starter N fertilizer and a foliar fungicide. However, the 15” rows also increased in yield with the addition of these inputs.
  • There was no response to S fertilizer at the site locations tested (clay loam and silt loam soils).

Joanna Follings (Wheat)

1. Winter Wheat Staging Guides

Extension funding was utilized to support the printing and distribution of over 750 winter wheat staging guides to growers across the province. This included distribution of guides to all grower participants in the Great Lakes Yield Enhancement Network (YEN) and growers attending the Ontario Crop Diagnostic Days, Eastern Crop Diagnostic Days, various soil and crop improvement association grower meetings, the Outdoor Farm Show, Ontario Ag Conference, Eastern Crops Conference and Midwestern Crop Conference. This guide has been a valuable resource for growers to utilize when making in-season management decisions in their winter wheat crop.

2. Great Lakes YEN How to Videos

Extension funding was used to create support tools for the Great Lakes YEN including a video on how to collect a grab sample and ship the sample. Growers in the Great Lakes YEN have been able to utilize these tools to collect the most accurate data that enables quality reporting at the end of the program. This video is hosted on the Great Lakes YEN website and will be a valuable tool for Great Lakes YEN growers in the 2024 season, with an estimated 125 growers participating.

3. Ontario Cereal Crop Committee (OCCC) Trials, Emo, Ontario

Extension funding was used to support the OCCC trials at the Emo research station in Northern Ontario. These are the only trials that are available to support growers in the northwest portion of the province. Cereals are an important part of the cropping system in this part of northern Ontario and without these trials growers in this region would have limited access to up-to-date information on how varieties perform and respond in their unique climate. This information is posted at www.GoCrops.ca. The most commonly used pages include the performance pages for all cereals as well as the head-to-head feature which allows growers to compare specific varieties and characteristics that may be best suited for their operation. www.GoCrops.ca is home to all Ontario cereal performance data and cereal production related information.

4.Ontario Field Crop Extension Videos

Extension funding was used to create videos on various topics for Ontario’s field crop producers. These videos covered topics including cover crops, compaction, case studies of no-till and reduced till producer experiences, and producer viewpoints on replacing seeding equipment. Some of these videos have been shown at the Outdoor Farm Show and Ontario Ag Conference, with the remaining videos to be posted to the Field Crop News YouTube channel.

External Funding Partners:

None.

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