42nd Annual North Central Extension-Industry Soil Fertility Conference
Day one of the North Central Extension-Industry Soil Fertility meeting has wrapped up here in Des Moines, Iowa. There were a number of talks focused on potassium (K) and the challenges in evaluating K deficiency.
Lara Moody of The Fertilizer Institute (TFI) delivered a powerful message centered around TFI's 4Rs, which are aimed at growers applying the right fertilizer, at the right rate, during the right time window, and in the right place.
Our company mission lines up very well with the 4Rs in that we're working to develop technology that will help growers apply N during the best possible time window for corn. We also expect to have follow-on offerings that will tune application rate based on plant monitoring or other tools--speaking to the "right place." The graph below shows that the peak time for N uptake (steepest part of the curve) is during mid-summer, when corn is beyond knee high and before it tassles. Thus, applications of N near to, but in advance of this peak can help to avoid loss of N in runoff or to the air.
Credit: Iowa State University Extension.
Cover Crop Field Day at Cedar Meadow Farm
Steve Groff hosted his 18th annual field day on cover crops at his farm outside Lancaster PA on Nov. 7 -- 8. There were testimonials from early adopters of this new wave of cover cropping. We also saw some demos of seeders, including an innovative system for knocking down a standing cover crop so that a new crop, such as corn, can be effectively seeded. We were treated to a brief demo of seeding via helicopter, however, I wasn't so sure that the pilot should even take off given the windy conditions.
Our interest for being there was to learn more about the need for seeding cover crops following corn. The challenge is to get the crop seeded soon enough that it can get established before winter. One strategy is to grow corn that takes fewer days to mature, leaving a longer period after harvest in the fall before the first killing frost. There's another strategy developed by Greg Roth and colleagues at Penn State that features an interseeder for seeding a cover crop while sidedressing N in early summer. We are working on a solution for seeding cover crops during August, just before the corn begins to senesce, allowing light to penetrate through the canopy.
Cover crops offer a great way to help manage nutrients on croplands. There are certainly challenges to working cover crops into with corn, and we believe that the more tools growers have in their toolbox, the better.
Tillage radish, from CoverCropSolutions.com
Listenting to the Experts
Hoping to learn more about what keeps growers from using in-season applications of nitrogen (sidedress N), we've engaged some folks on the AgTalk forum. A first post asked simply to hear about growers' experiences with sidedressing. This sparked a great conversation with more than a dozen growers. Largely enthusiasts of sidedressing, we posted a second query: Why aren't more acres of corn sidedressed? This second post led to quite a debate over the role of robotic vehicles in agriculture. Worth a read!
N being sidedressed. (John Lundvall) via Iowa State IPM.
Welcome!
Welcome to the RowBot website. Since forming the company in May 2012, we've had a busy few months collecting data in corn fields. We'll be using this data over the coming months to develop an early prototype of the innovative, patent protected technology we will be bringing to production agriculture in the coming years.
We'll be adding periodic updates about our company here. Stay tuned!
