Nutrino Pro and Status® help reduce nitrogen applications

Ryan Overton, an agronomist with Frontier Agriculture based in Cambridgeshire, has confirmed that IntraCrop’s Status® biostimulant is a key part of his agronomic plan for this season, which will help to reduce nitrogen applications.

“I first used Status® two years ago on wheat, after some really bad frost damage,” he said. “It changed the crop dramatically within three weeks and saved a 200ha block near low-lying land by taking the stress out and making the crop re-tiller.  I then decided to add it to all my wheat crops at T1 and despite the heat and lack of moisture all the crops looked well, better in fact than in a normal growing season, and all delivered higher than average yields.”

Mr Overton also applied Status® to 100ha of sugar beet crops in 2022, when he was concerned about the effect of 43-degree heat on his root crops. “I added Status® in a tank with fungicide two days before the heat hit. All the other sugar beet was flagging but the Status®-treated wheat was bolt upright and bright green.  A week later, on the untreated crop every leaf on the floor was burnt away. That year we harvested nearly 90 t/ha on the treated crop, compared with a five-year average of 65 – 70 t/ha.”

As a result of the 2022 successes, Mr Overton applied Status® to a range of crops in 2023, including cereals, maize, sugar beet and potatoes.  Even though this was a completely different season in terms of weather, he still found Status® made a significant difference to all his crops. “In sugar beet, we applied Status® with the first insecticide and the first fungicide. The jump in growth was seen very quickly and it allowed an earlier and easier lifting.”

Status® is also successful in potato crops, according to Mr Overton. “We used Status® twice on our potato crops in 2022 and saw better tubering. In 2023 we repeated the two applications and in yield digs saw a 12 t/ha increase in our chipping potatoes.”

Status® is proven to protect the photosynthetic apparatus during stress conditions, improving plant resilience and speeding up recovery from abiotic stress to protect yields. In healthy conditions, it increases green leaf retention and increases nutrient use efficiency, resulting in higher yield and quality. IntraCrop recommends applying Status® as a flexible spring treatment to protect against the onslaught of abiotic stress. As Mr Overton concludes, “Status® takes away the peaks and troughs and keeps the plant growing healthily despite the stress. As long as it’s in the crop a few days before the stress happens, it will alleviate it, so look at the forecast and see if a cold snap or heat is anticipated.”

Find out more about Status here.

 

28th February 2024