Healthy diets for healthier growth.

“CropTec provides a great forum for discussing the latest in crop nutrition with farmers and their advisers.

The diet of a crop is absolutely essential as to how it grows. A properly fed crop will be better able to resist disease, weeds and pests while delivering yield and quality. The last year has demonstrated the importance of good crop nutrition with crops under attack from disease and a declining number of crop protection options to fight off that disease. We have anecdotally heard that farmers using a targeted programme of micro-nutrient application saw less disease than others.

Just looking at a crop is not enough to determine its nutritional need with deficient crops often looking similar to those that are nutritionally richer. We call this a ‘hidden hunger’ that can have an effect throughout the season. It is important to understand the nutritional requirements of the crop at key points in the season so we advise growers to undertake tissue analysis at least once or twice in the autumn and then again in the key spring growing periods. This allows them to determine what the crop needs and act accordingly.

One area that is gaining more attention is micro-nutrients with greater understanding about the role of boron, manganese, molybdenum, magnesium and zinc in oilseed rape and manganese, copper and zinc in cereals, not just in terms of their contribution to yield and quality, but also their role in the plants natural defence mechanisms. The role of these nutrients will be an area we will be looking at both during our presentation at CropTec and also on our stand.

The greater use and availability of new nutritional technology, including Yara’s own N-Sensor and N-Tester, is helping farmers understand the dietary needs of their crops more so events such as CropTec are important to see the latest technology and how it can apply back home.”

For more on CropTec go to http://www.croptecshow.com