With the wild weather conditions served up by Mother Nature, ongoing disease concerns and never-ending pest pressure, corn and soybean growers look for every way possible to protect their seed and crop investments. While there are many options to protect crops, one of the best ways is to protect crops before the seed is ever planted — with in-furrow fungicide protection.
It’s a critical phase of a plant’s life when seeds germinate and plants begin to emerge, as they are most vulnerable to injury, disease and water stress. Adding an in-furrow fungicide will allow roots to take up the product and move it through the plant with water and nutrients to also deliver disease (and potentially insect) control, which helps protect plants from the very beginning.
“By applying fungicide in-furrow, growers can secure extra disease protection covering both the area around the seed and in the furrow,” said Lynn Justesen, Senior Technical Sales Specialist for Fungicides, UPL. “With this application, seedlings get that extra protection, which may lead to increased nutrient and water intake. It also may help prevent seedling damage by promoting seedling emergence, which should lead to a uniform stand and healthy root development.”
For those growers who have already looked at in-furrow fungicide applications, there has been a challenge with existing products not being compatible with liquid starter fertilizers. But new solutions for the agriculture market, including TEPERA® PLUS Fungicide+Insecticide and TEPERA Fungicide, provide growers with options that are compatible with liquid starter fertilizer, providing proven in-furrow performance with easy application.
The Results
In on-farm trials in 2017, TEPERA PLUS applied in-furrow while planting corn produced a yield increase of 13 to 15 bushels per acre on average compared to the untreated control and 6 bushels per acre in soybeans. And with TEPERA, growers saw a 5 to 6 bushel-per-acre increase in corn and 3 to 4 bushels in soybeans.
Ease of Use
Growers also want easy-to-use products in-furrow. With products like TEPERA and TEPERA PLUS, there is no dilution necessary to mix with liquid starter fertilizers. Each product stays in solution with minimal agitation in even the toughest fertilizer mixes, and both can be applied with water if starter fertilizer is not going to be used.
“You really don’t need to add or modify any equipment to use most products with liquid fertilizer. It just goes right in,” Justesen added. “It’s not a finicky formulation that turns into cottage cheese if you leave it in solution overnight.”
From the Field
Ord, Nebraska, grower Brad Eppenbach used TEPERA PLUS on his 2017 corn acres amidst challenging weather conditions. The results proved favorable.
“We had four days of 40 mile-per-hour winds, and the TEPERA PLUS-treated corn hung on the ear really well and had good plant health, but some neighbors who didn’t treat had 50 bushels of corn per acre on the ground due to the winds,” Eppenbach said. “We treated all our corn acres with TEPERA PLUS and saw a 10 to 15 bushel increase in yield.”
Eppenbach also treated his 2017 soybeans with TEPERA PLUS.
“I tried TEPERA PLUS in half a pivot of beans, and we saw a 6 bushel increase in yield,” Eppenbach added. “It’s a simple product to use, and it worked great. I told neighbors that TEPERA PLUS is easy to use; you put it in the tank with starter fertilizer, all one machine.”
So as corn and soybean growers continue looking for ways to improve their crop health and end-of-season yields, they now have a great in-furrow fungicide option that can not only fend off disease and pests early in the season, help roots and plants remain healthy and strong, and help growers achieve the yield results they want at the end of the season, but is easy to work with and apply as well.
For additional information, contact your local UPL representative.
