Francois Eudes is the director of research, development and technology for the science and technology branch at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada (AAFC) at Lethbridge. As part of his role, he oversees AAFC’s breeding, innovation and crop germplasm development.

Eudes says a big part of the multigenerational approach to breeding new varieties of cereal crops such as wheat and barley is eliminating offspring that won’t perform at sufficiently high levels.

“The selection process is much more about the elimination of poor genetics among the sister lines. We’re going to eliminate the poor-performing one under selection for some traits and move the better one to the next generation where another selection is going to be done,” he says.

The development of new cereal crop varieties is unique in comparison to most other crop types. Most of the crop breeding efforts in Western Canada are conducted by the public sector. That includes AAFC as well as post-secondary institutions such as the University of Saskatchewan, through its Crop Development Centre (CDC), the University of Alberta and the University of Saskatchewan.

In most cases, those institutions don’t directly commercialize the varieties they develop. Instead, they partner with stakeholders such as seed companies to commercialize those varieties through variety licensing agreements.

Curtis Pozniak, a professor and director of the CDC at the U of S, says it takes, on average, eight to 10 years to develop a new variety, which means breeders need to “have a bit of a crystal ball” when determining what the priorities need to be for future varieties.

The main areas of focus for breeders are typically yield and reliable yield performance in a range of different environments and soil types; disease and insect resistance; and tolerance to abiotic stresses such as drought and heat.

Marketability is another important consideration when developing new varieties of cereal crops, Pozniak adds.

“If you look at barley used in brewing, there’s a very specific quality profile that’s in demand by the industry and by the end-use customer. Likewise with wheat and durum, the quality profiles are very well defined in terms of what our customers are looking for,” he says.

“It’s all about developing the package of yield, reliability and marketability that’s most important, really pushing the yield envelope and having that combination of agronomic traits and pest-resistant traits that growers are demanding, while still maintaining that marketability and end-use quality.”

Like most crops, cereals have had to endure a wide range of severe weather conditions across Canada in the last several years, including drought and extended periods of extreme heat.

While that has been an important consideration when it comes to breeding efforts in cereals, it is not an entirely new breeding target. Pozniak says plant breeders have historically tested new cereal varieties in a wide range of conditions in order to select products that will perform well across a range of environments, and that continues to be the case.

“I wouldn’t say we’re necessarily focusing more on selecting for heat and drought tolerance. That has always been a breeding target, but the extreme heat and drought like we experienced this past summer have really provided us with the opportunity to evaluate those genetic combinations that do well,” he says.

Ellen Sparry, general manager of C&M Seeds at Palmerston, Ont., agrees. She recently came across a paper from the Canadian Journal of Research from 1936 referring to studies on drought resistance in spring wheat.

“It is always on a breeder’s radar to try and select the right varieties that combat drought and other climate challenges. That’s why we test varieties over several years before taking anything to commercialization,” she says.

That said, breeders are having to look at things in a slightly different, climate-induced light, she adds.

For example, changing climates have forced plant breeders to respond to shifts in disease. Sparry cited an example of a winter wheat her company developed that was wiped out in a single year due to leaf rust.

“It had good tolerance and then we had a shift one year and it was all but wiped out of the marketplace,” she says.

Eudes agrees climate change and extreme weather conditions are prompting plant breeders to look at some things in a new light. For crops such as wheat, he says that includes looking at varieties that have been grown in other countries to deal with even hotter and drier conditions and adapting that germplasm so those varieties can be successful here in Canada.

‘Nimble’

Plant breeding has traditionally been a marathon rather than a sprint, but some new tools have the potential to change that.

Gene editing technology has been around for some time but it’s still a relatively new concept in terms of Canadian agriculture. AAFC seeded the federal government’s first plots of gene-edited wheat in Lethbridge earlier this year.

Sparry says gene editing has the potential to be a game-changer when it comes to breeding new varieties of wheat and other cereal crops.

“I think it’s always on a breeder’s mind that they have to be nimble, which is not an easy thing to do in a breeding program,” she says. “Perhaps gene editing can get us there a little quicker. Hopefully, this is a goal that allows breeders to adapt a little bit quicker to changing situations.”

Tyler Groeneveld concurs. Groeneveld is the North American director of grains and oils for Corteva Agriscience. The company spends $4 million a day on research and development and, he says, a tool like gene editing has the potential to unlock a host of new opportunities.

“The advent of gene editing and our expertise with that particular modern plant breeding tool means that we’ll be able to identify and commercialize traits of interest and seed technology quicker than we would in the traditional biotechnology route to market,” he says.

Another relatively new tool that could help plant breeding efforts is phenomic selection. It’s a low-cost, high-throughput alternative to the use of genetic markers, employing spectral data to predict complex traits with statistical models that use software algorithms.

Eudes says phenomic technology is still relatively new here in Canada but has been in use in Europe for more than a decade already. In one example of its use, multiple data sets could be collected via drones to monitor a crop and predict its performance even before that crop has reached maturity.

“That way, a decision could be made earlier, either to continue the evaluation of the line or essentially eliminate that line,” he explains.

‘Diversification’

As these new tools and technologies continue to evolve, new varieties of cereal crops are being introduced into the developmental pipeline.

Earlier this year Corteva introduced its new Trusource wheat. Trusource is a high-fibre durum wheat that provides increased dietary fibre in everyday foods such as pasta. It’s currently available to food companies for trial in product development and will be released commercially to farmers sometime in the next few years.

“Trusource wheat will bring new nutritional innovation to wheat and … benefits compared to traditional wheat. It supports improved gut health and blood sugar management. It helps promote satiety (fullness),” Groeneveld says.

“It’s a very exciting opportunity when we look at market diversification and increase in value for a crop that Canada is known for — being a very high quality, reliable supplier in durum to the global market.”

AAFC is expected to announce its next set of co-op trials and which lines it will register following the Prairie Grain Development Committee’s meeting in February.

Eudes says one of the most promising cereal crops AAFC has in its developmental pipeline is a durum wheat that was developed in Swift Current. It has been shown to have intermediate resistance to fusarium head blight (FHB) — the first durum wheat in Canada to be so rated. It was registered in February 2023 and should be available to farmers within the next two years.

In addition, AAFC breeders are working on a new higher-performing variety of milling oat as a replacement for AC Morgan which, Eudes says, is getting “a bit old,” having been around since 1999.

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Corteva Agriscience in mid-November said it’s made a “revolutionary breakthrough” with which it expects to produce hybrid hard red winter wheat for the North American market “as early as 2027” and add other hybrid wheats to the product line over time.

The U.S. company sounds quite upbeat about the performance of its “first-of-its kind, proprietary non-GMO hybrid technology.” It notes its internal yield trial testing shows a 10 per cent increase in yield potential “while using the same amount of land and resources” and yields roughly 20 per cent higher than current “elite” varieties in “water-stressed environments.”

(Those trials, Corteva says, were run at six to 10 locations per year over two years, with hard red winter wheat testing done in Oklahoma, Kansas, Nebraska and Colorado.)

Of course, a lot of unknowns still swirl around this announcement. Will this wheat, or one like it, be available to Canadian growers? Corteva has since told us it anticipates introducing the product to the Canadian market at some point but doesn’t yet have a hard timeline for it. It also says it plans to also bring this technology to the hard red spring class by decade’s end.

Also: how will this differ from hybrids other companies have in the pipeline? We’re still waiting to hear more, though we know the answer will be different from just a few years ago, when several players appeared to be racing to get hybrid wheats to market.

From Prairie wheat growers’ perspective, the most significant of those was Bayer, which in the mid-2010s set up a breeding station and trial acreage near Pike Lake, south of Saskatoon, devoted to hybrid wheat. But in 2018 Bayer, needing antitrust approvals for its takeover of Monsanto, sold that shop among others to BASF — which in turn walked away from North American hybrid wheat development in 2023, saying its trials “have not achieved the development goals we set to meet the needs of growers in Canada and the United States” and that it would instead focus its work on European markets.

Syngenta, working on its own hybrid wheats since 2010, rolled out a few thousand acres’ worth of hybrid HRS wheat seed for U.S. growers in 2023 under the brand name AgriPro. It also expects its products to show a 10-12 per cent bump in yield potential compared to current wheats — and that it will produce other hybrid HRS and HRW wheats for the U.S. market within the next few years.

The company, however, also walked away from hybrid wheat development for the Canadian market in 2018, and says it has no plans to bring its new U.S. wheats up here either. “The products continuing to come through the pipeline are not a fit for the industry standards that Canada has today,” a Syngenta rep told the Western Producer in 2023.

Past all that is the big question: cost. As Jim Timlick notes elsewhere in these pages, Corteva alone spends $4 million per day on R+D and needs to recoup such investment from somebody. If its new wheats are ultimately a fit for the Prairie market, that somebody is you.

Setting that price point is the challenge facing Corteva and others. Whatever they ultimately charge growers for this achievement, is a 10 per cent boost in yield potential — 20, in a dry year — going to pencil out for growers who put down cash for this product?

It’s a question the seed companies need to consider carefully — because along with the big breakthroughs come the bills for all the work that didn’t pan out. And while a lot of those expenses are deductible down the road, the bills have still gotta be paid.

The post Editor’s Rant: The price tag on progress appeared first on Grainews.

According to one pitch, if farmers add biological X to the soil, they can cut nitrogen rates by 15 pounds per acre. According to another, biological Y can control a fungus that attacks canola and is just as effective as a synthetic fungicide.

Those sales pitches sound appealing, but they don’t reflect the role of biologicals in crop production, says a representative of Corteva AgriScience. Biologicals can complement other products and practices but they’re not a replacement for chemistry or fertilizer.

“We have to measure our expectations on what these things can do, and not compare them to some of these herbicides or fungicides,” said Ryan Bonnett, Canadian commercial lead for biologicals at Corteva.

“A herbicide or fungicide, they go out and kill a pest. They kill a weed or they kill a disease… These products (biologicals) do something a little bit different.”

In agriculture, they can be described as bacteria, microbes, plant extracts and other natural products that provide a vital function for the crop. They typically fall into three categories: biopesticides, biofertilizers and biostimulants.

The market for agricultural biologicals has exploded in recent years, as it seems like hundreds of companies are competing for acres and farmers’ attention.

Competition, and the need to stand out, have led to aggressive claims and promotions. Some firms say biologicals can duplicate the functions of synthetic products.

“Biologicals like nitrogen-fixing bacteria can … reduce the need for applied N fertilizer without reducing yields, a solution that can help farmers with their productivity and sustainability goals,” the website of one firm says.

Such messages are problematic, Bonnett said.

“I would say that’s not the case. I would say they complement a good fertility program. They’re not necessarily able to, from a farmer’s perspective, (permit a) 20-lb. drop of nitrogen.”

In a late June interview, Bonnett said a biological product is comparable to a human health supplement. Consuming vitamins and omega-3 supplements can help a person stay healthy, but they’re different from an antibiotic that can cure strep throat.

“A lot of folks have thought of this as a conventional technology, which it’s not,” he said.

MORE ON BIOLOGICALS:

• Nitrogen-fixing biologicals fall short at field level
• Ways to improve the microbiome
• Nutrien buys into biocontrol
• Farmer interest growing in plant biostimulants

There are about 1,200 biologicals in the agricultural marketplace, Bonnett said. It’s difficult to sort out what product No. 376 can do for a crop and how it’s different from No. 831.

For a grower, a good place to start is understanding the agronomic problem and what they’re trying to solve.

“Is there a certain issue on your farm that can’t be addressed with normal, conventional technologies that we use in agriculture?”

One example is plant stress during the first weeks of the growing season. This June, temperatures dropped to 0 C or below in parts of Alberta.

Such temperatures can put the brakes on crop development and will set it back “by multiple days,” Bonnett said.

“There are (biostimulant) products you can use directly after that weather event to kickstart that crop’s growth stage,” he explained.

“We want to tell the crop, no, no, no. It was just cold for a day. Let’s kickstart your photosynthetic ability. Let’s kickstart your normal hormonal processes. … The faster you get that crop established, the faster it is using the moisture and nutrients available and not get outcompeted … by weeds, for example.”

Another example is heat stress. Some biologicals on the market, including Corteva products, help crops through the hottest days of the season.

“It’s going to reduce the amount of damage that hot weather does to your crop.”

For a biostimulant or any biological to work, the bacteria or active ingredient must be alive. Unlike a chemical, it’s a living organism.

And it’s difficult to transport such products by plane, train or truck from a manufacturing plant to a farm because some bacteria are highly sensitive to temperature.

Biologicals’ efficacy can also break down on the farm. It’s less costly and more efficient to make one pass over a field and apply two products, such as a biostimulant and a herbicide. That practice may not work for biologicals that don’t thrive in a tank mix.

Acquisitions

Before joining Corteva, Bonnett worked for a Texas company called the Stoller Group. Corteva last year closed deals to buy Stoller and its biological technology for US$1.2 billion and a separate Spanish biologicals developer, Symborg, for an undisclosed sum.

Big players in crop protection may continue to acquire smaller fish in the biological business.

One reason is interest rates. It’s difficult to operate a firm that’s technology rich and cash poor when rates are above five per cent.

“When you get to six per cent, the world changes,” Bonnett said. “You’re burning cash and that cash is costing you a lot (of interest) to service.”

The post Biologicals aren’t the silver bullet appeared first on Grainews.

“That’s a very good question. I get that quite often,” Beland says with a laugh.

Beland is the director of market development for Premier Tech, which offers a variety of biological inputs to the agriculture market. 

He may hear that same question even more often in days to come. A recent survey of nearly 800 farmers from across the country, conducted by Corteva Agriscience, showed growing interest in biologicals. Seventy-nine per cent of respondents said they are already using or are interested in learning more about biological and biostimulant products. Eighty-two per cent said they would consider adding a biostimulant to their crop nutrient plan. 

By definition, biologicals are inputs or products created from naturally occurring micro-organisms, plant extracts, beneficial insects or other organic compounds. Think of a naturally occurring organism or substance that enhances, but doesn’t replace, natural processes to stimulate an increase in nutrient uptake or use efficiency in crops. Biologicals also allow growers to reduce the use of some chemical and fertilizer inputs. 

They can be grouped into one of three categories: biostimulants, biofertilizers and biocontrols. 

Biostimulants are perhaps the most commonly known of the three and can include microbials that produce or alter plant hormones to stimulate growth, nutrient uptake or relieve abiotic stress. They can also include amino acids or protein hydrolysates that provide available nitrogen and stimulate microbial activity. Other examples are seaweed and plant extracts with an antioxidant effect that can relieve stress and promote microbial activity. 

Driving interest 

Dale Cowan is strategy manager and senior agronomist for AGRIS Co-operative, a full-service, farmer- owned co-op with 10 retail locations in Ontario. AGRIS offers a number of biological products and Cowan says interest in them has spiked as the number of products and research into those products has climbed. 

Cowan says much of this interest resulted from recent research that indicates as much as 70 per cent of yield can be determined by abiotic stresses including hot or dry conditions. 

“That’s what’s driven this industry. If you know drought is coming, do we have a product that increases water-use efficiency in the plant and can help us get ahead of that drought? 

“What product do I use and do I put it on before or after or during? And what’s my yield response going to be? That’s the big question mark and that’s where everyone struggles, is to figure out what’s the most efficacious way to use these products. Filling this gap between planting and harvesting, is there something I can do in between times of the critical growth stage just to keep adding yield potential?” 

Although biologicals such as biostimulants can address some stresses, Cowan cautions that they are not a cure-all. 

“These things are designed to alleviate abiotic stresses or lessen the effect of biotic stresses,” he says. 

“The yield gains here are rather nominal on these products. They’re not a panacea for fixing production problems. They are designed to alleviate some of these stresses at critical times through the growing season. 

“They’re not going to replace good management decisions and good base fertility and good agronomic practices. They’re designed to augment and supplement (them).” 

Importance of education 

Beland says it’s important for companies like his to educate growers and agronomists on how these products work. 

“That’s one of the important pillars we have at Premier Tech and that’s education. If you don’t help and educate the end user, he doesn’t really know what the benefits are or what to look for.” 

“Having that education portion of things … is important, to be able to read different labels, to see which are viable and which are not, which are more crop specific and which are more general. We need to educate and have farmers understand and be able to process things so they make sense and they can decide if they want to use this tool on their farm.” 

What’s the problem? 

Cowan says one of the first things agronomists should discuss with clients about biologicals is the kind of problem or issue they want the products to address. 

“Selling a product just for the sake of selling a product without knowing where it fits or whether it’s going to do any good, that’s a moderate risk to a high risk situation,” he says. 

“We have to have a purpose for recommending some products. What we don’t want to do is recommend them and say ‘you’ll be amazed.’ Amazed at what? We have to try to be very specific.” 

Cowan also urges caution when using a biological product for the first time. He says agronomists may want to recommend that their clients conduct on-farm strip trials with any new biologicals. 

“The only real way to definitively understand the thing you’re doing on your farm under your system or our agronomy practice is to do strip trials,” he says. 

“All of a sudden we’ve got 25 replications, 50 replications across the field that you can pick up with your monitor. You’ll soon know whether these things are adding to yield or helping the bottom line.” 

Cowan, who was inducted into the Ontario Agri- cultural Hall of Fame earlier this year, says agronomists should make their clients aware that many of the companies that produce biologicals are eager to work with farmers. In some cases, they are willing to give product to a producer in exchange for results from crop trials. 

“Probably the biggest advantage I’ve seen to some of these mainline companies buying these smaller biological companies up is they are investing in research,” he says. 

“There’s actually been some major investments going into the research, which wasn’t always the case with some of these biostimulants in the past. They tended to be promoted based on someone’s experience or testimonial type advertising. As agronomists dealing with farmers (making) serious investments, we’d rather have the data.” 

What works, what doesn’t 

Jarrett Chambers is the founder of ATP Nutrition, a Canadian-owned and operated nutrient company. When selecting biologicals, he says farmers and agronomists should learn not only where it will work, but also where it won’t. 

“It’s not Frank’s RedHot sauce. You don’t put this stuff on everything,” he says. 

Chambers also recommends that agronomists emphasize to their clients that biologicals should only be used as part of a well thought-out fertility program. 

“You can’t use it in isolation. Be sure you already have a good fertility program and let’s make it more efficient,” he says. “Have that conversation in the months of October through April and then go to your farm and say where do I think there’s areas for improvement and see if that biological or biostimulant can fit into that.” 

Cowan says it’s also important for producers and agronomists to know the kinds of products that biologicals can be mixed with. For example, some products are not compatible with urea ammonium nitrate or herbicides. 

Also of note is that most biostimulants and other biological products have a limited shelf life. Care must be taken so they don’t go to waste. 

“They’re not like other inert chemicals. They’re living entities,” he says. 

To that end, agronomists should read product labels and advise clients on proper storage, including any temperature restrictions. 

“Get an understanding with your grower that we’re going to use this product at such and such time,” Cowan says. 

“It’s this whole idea of building a relation- ship with your customer so we both have an understanding of what it is we’re doing here and that I’m not going to have stuff in inventory and an endless product supply in case you might want to try it. It really changes the supply chain dynamics with these products. 

Pre-crop planning 

Beland agrees that getting as much information as possible on biologicals and how they work is an integral part of any pre-crop planning. That should include detailed information on how a product performed in trials and whether an independent third party compiled the results. 

In the case of Premier Tech, the company works with a number of third party collaborators to verify the efficacy of its product in terms of yield gains and to benchmark them against other biologicals on the market. 

“Obviously, there’s an educational portion where we need to explain how (the product) works. But at the end of the day, it’s also about what ends up in my pocket as a farmer. Sure, we can show the quality and the performance, but it’s what ends up in the bin and what they invested and how much more they’ve got (that’s important).

– This article was originally published in the November 2023 issue of GrowPro magazine.

The post Understanding biological crop inputs appeared first on Grainews.

“Anthracnose is a polycyclic disease, which means it can go through multiple life cycles during the growing season and due to this can spread rapidly in warm, humid conditions. Depending on timing and severity of infection, yield losses can exceed 50 per cent,” says Brown.

To make matters worse, anthracnose resistant to Group 11 strobilurin fungicides has started to show up in some lentil-producing areas in the Prairies.

Corteva Agriscience is offering a solution — a new crop protection product called Zetigo PRM with the Adavelt active. According to Corteva, the Adavelt active is a Group 21 fungicide with a novel mode of action that makes it a strong resistance management tool.

“This is good news for lentil growers,” says Brown. “With the recent confirmation of strobilurin-insensitive anthracnose populations in lentils, the introduction of a new fungicide group to lentil producers with activity on anthracnose is timely.

“This fungicide adds another tool to a lentil producer’s tool kit as the only registered Group 21 fungicide in Western Canada (which was only used) for late blight on potatoes until now. As part of an integrated pest management plan that includes cultural practices, a diverse crop rotation and mixing and rotating fungicide modes of action, it will help in fighting fungicide insensitivity.”

Kirsten Ratzlaff, product manager for seed applied technology at Corteva Agriscience, described Zetigo PRM as “a solid tool for disease management, but also a really important solution for resistance management” in an interview with Grainews.

“Novel modes of action certainly don’t happen every day … so we’re certainly excited to be able to provide a very critical tool for a very critical crop group in Western Canada,” she says.

“When we think about resistance management, there’s really only so many tools in the tool box. Bringing in new actives can help protect our technology and ensures we still get that high level of disease protection we need.”

PREVENTIVE AND CURATIVE PROPERTIES

According to a Corteva Agriscience press release, the Adavelt active offers preventive properties against a wide range of diseases severely affecting yield, along with curative properties when used in the early stages of infection.

“By adding Adavelt to disease management programs, farmers can simplify fungal control efforts and reduce resistance risks, while protecting the yield potential and quality of crops, both now and in future seasons,” stated the release.

Robert King, executive vice-president of crop protection business at Corteva Agriscience, states in the release that the commercialization of the Adavelt active is a testament to the company’s strong R&D pipeline.

“Farmers have a critical need for innovative fungicides to address the challenges they face today. Adavelt active delivers exactly that — a new, flexible option to protect crops and preserve yield potential.”

Bretton Davie, communications leader for Corteva Agriscience Canada, told Grainews the Adavelt active was developed after the discovery of a naturally occurring fungicide found in soil microbes, which scientists dubbed UK-2A.

“From there, Corteva Agriscience set to work making improvements and ultimately bringing to market Inatreq active, a naturally derived fungicide for cereal and banana crops,” says Davie.

“Researchers at Corteva then saw even more potential and turned their attention to designing a product that could expand fungicide options for farmers. The result was Adavelt.”

Zetigo PRM was approved and registered for use in lentils in Canada in March, and Corteva Agriscience is anticipating approval for use in additional pulse crops in time for the 2024 season.

“We really wanted to make sure this very valuable option for lentil growers is accessible as early as possible,” says Ratzlaff. “We are running an introductory launch focused primarily on lentils support for 2023, targeting the critical diseases there and most notably anthracnose, which we know is one of the most significant, if not the most significant, disease in that crop.

“Then we are working on expanding the label for the 2024 season. We’ll launch broadly with a much more significant volume with a very extended pulse crop and pulse disease label.”

Brown says that’s welcome news for Prairie farmers. “Registration on other pulses and diseases would be a benefit to pulse producers, increasing the fungicide options available to them and ultimately helping to fight fungicide insensitivity.”

Ratzlaff says the Adavelt active was trialled at a number of sites in Western Canada last year. She adds Corteva Agriscience plans to step that up this season with an extensive program of field-scale trials on pulse producers’ farms.

Canada was one of three countries — Australia and South Korea were the others — where the Adavelt active received product registration earlier this year. Corteva plans to offer Adavelt in more countries in the coming years, following regulatory approvals in those jurisdictions.

“There’s going to be a range of diseases ultimately on the label,” says Ratzlaff. “This is an active that’s going to provide a high level of protection in more than 30 crops across the world.”

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First on the scene was a biological product from NexusBioAg called Envita, which is a naturally occurring bacterium called Gluconacetobacter diazotrophicus. Envita was approved for use by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency in June 2020, following six years of farm trials on corn and soybean crops in the United States and Canada. It had its first full-season launch in Canada last year.

In November 2021, Corteva Agriscience followed suit by introducing Utrisha N, another naturally derived nitrogen-fixing bacterium that Prairie farmers can utilize for the 2022 growing season.

According to Kirsten Ratzlaff, product manager for seed applied technology, fungicides and nutrient management for Corteva Agriscience, Utrisha N was trialed at about 200 sites across Canada last year.

“It’s been quite a rigorous testing process to ensure that nutrition is going to provide the value we intend to provide our Canadian growers,” Ratzlaff says.

“We are really pleased with what we’ve seen performance-wise so far, and we intend to release a full yield summary and trial summary early in the new year.”

Utrisha N is applied as a foliar application. It enters the stomata openings on the epidermis of leaves and other plant material and colonizes the cells within them. The bacteria then quickly begin to capture nitrogen from the air and convert it into a usable form for the plant.

“This capture and convert process continues throughout the life cycle of the plant, resulting in a constant supply of nitrogen throughout the growing season,” says Ratzlaff.

A biostimulant like Utrisha N offers farmers faced with escalating fertilizer prices with another mode of action and a supplemental source of nitrogen, which enables farmers to improve the efficiency of their nutrient management programs. Utrisha N is also a sustainable source of nitrogen, since there are no leaching or loss implications or greenhouse gases released.

“We know that nitrogen fertilizers are a critical component to all farming operations, but they are also subject to loss or may not necessarily be available where or when the plant needs it,” Ratzlaff says. “That’s where Utrisha N comes in — to give that continuous supplemental support and source to ensure the plant has what it needs, when it needs it.”

Utrisha N is designed for established crops across Canada, including canola, cereals, soybeans and corn. Ratzlaff says as a foliar product, Utrisha N can be applied with spraying equipment found on most farms.

For western Canadian farmers, the optimal application timing for all types of cereal crops is the four-leaf jointing stage, and in canola it is the four-leaf to rosette stage, before stem elongation. For corn and soybeans, application should be at the V4 to V8 stage.

Utrisha N is the first in a wave of new biological options for farmers coming from Corteva Agriscience.

“The portfolio is growing, and it is a significant priority for Corteva,” says Ratzlaff. “We’re investing in multiple categories, in biostimulants like Utrisha N, but also in the categories of biocontrol products and pheromones.”

“We think this market is going to continue to grow and growers are going to find value for these types of solutions.”

Farm industry receptive

Developed by Azotic North America, Envita was registered in the United States in 2019 and then here in Canada a year later. NexusAgBio is the product’s distributor in Canada.

Daniel Samphir, senior marketing manager at NexusBioAg, says Envita was on display at the company’s BioAdvantage Trials Program, staged in 2021 to demonstrate the product’s effectiveness. A total of 52 farmers from Western Canada and 40 farmers from Eastern Canada took part.

“We were really excited with our first-year results,” says Samphir, adding there was widespread interest among growers, product dealers, agronomists and the grain industry as a whole.

“This is a tool in the fertility toolbox that we haven’t had until this point,” says Nolan Berg, president of Azotic North America. “Canada has been actually a pleasant surprise in terms of how fast the uptake has been. The entire industry has been very receptive to it.”

Berg says innovative farmers and early adopters are leading the way, but added Envita is also gaining popularity with mainstream growers, noting the high cost of fertilizer and supply chain disruptions could be a factor.

Envita works by forming a symbiotic relationship with the host plant after it enters plant cells. It replicates and spreads throughout the whole plant, providing an alternative source of nitrogen that’s available all season long. By starting to fix nitrogen right away, Envita can also help with early plant establishment.

“It gets into the plant immediately, starts fixing nitrogen immediately and grows with the plant immediately,” says Berg. “We see, basically, a pop-up effect in soybeans and corn and other crops because of the speed of establishment.”

Envita can be applied both in-furrow and in foliar applications, and can be tank mixed with leading starter fertilizers as well as post-emergence herbicides. “We just want to give growers as many options as possible,” he says.

“We talk in terms of Envita filling the nitrogen gap. Imagine there is drought conditions like last year … and the crop only could get to 75 per cent of the nitrogen that it needed. Envita can fill that gap on a corn crop up to 25 per cent,” says Berg. “We actually see even more improved results with Envita under stress conditions.”

“What we say to farmers is the first thing to do is to put Envita on with full fertility and see the upside. Prove it to yourself on your crops, on your farm and your conditions.”

Berg says the deepest data sets for Envita have been for corn and soybeans, and the numbers show soybean producers can get up to two to four more bushels per acre and corn producers up to seven to 10 bushels more per acre.

“We’re seeing some great results,” he adds. “When you start talking $5.50 or $6.00 corn and you’re getting seven more bushels, that’s pretty appealing.”

Envita is in the final stages of data review for canola and wheat yields, but Samphir says the preliminary numbers are encouraging, “especially with the price that canola is now.”

Berg points out Envita also comes with a performance guarantee for canola, wheat, soybeans and corn, as an added incentive for farmers to try it. “We take the risk away (with the guarantee), which essentially boils down to the product paying for itself at current commodity prices,” he says.

Potential game changer 

John Heard, a soil fertility extension specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, believes products like Envita and Utrisha N could be very useful in helping to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fertilizers used on Canadian farms. 

Heard says field trials of the new, nitrogen-fixing biological products have been conducted mostly by industry to date, and he believes more rigorous field validation is required to assess their efficacy in western Canadian environments. However, he thinks they have the potential to be a real game changer. 

“Until Ag Canada and the universities solidly validate these products, they may not be accepted quickly, but that could be the silver bullet if they work,” Heard says. 

The president of Azotic North America, Nolan Berg, says initial work on studying greenhouse gas emissions has shown Envita can reduce emissions by the equivalent of 65 kilograms of carbon dioxide per ton of corn. He believes if producers are regulated to reduce emissions from on-farm use of fertilizers, “products like Envita will become even more important.”

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Making the decision on whether to swath or straight cut the crop often depends on how the crop looks heading into late summer or early fall — usually just before harvest, says researcher Chad Koscielny, North American canola breeding lead for Corteva. More producers (somewhere around 60 per cent of Prairie farmers) are adopting straight cutting of canola for a number of reasons, with the elimination of one field operation leading the list.  

“Selecting varieties that provide farmers flexibility in making that decision at harvest is a valuable risk management tool,” says Koscielny. “Especially in a dry growing season, producers can end up with a lot of variability in crop maturity.” 

For example, perhaps the crop on the drier mid- and upper slopes of a field matured sooner, somewhere around 80 or 90 per cent seed colour change, compared with the lower lying areas of the field where the crop likely has more yield potential, but it is in the 60 to 70 per cent seed colour change. How do you handle that? If you wait for the whole field to be mature, you might run the risk of increased shatter losses in the crop in those early-maturing zones. On the other hand, if you combine too soon, you increase the risk of harvesting immature crop with too much green seed. 

• Read more: Taking a look at canola harvest options

That’s where selecting varieties that have built in pod shatter resistance, such as Corteva’s HarvestMax trait, take some of the decision-making pressure off, says Koscielny. “Whether a farmer is straight cutting or swathing, varieties with the HarvestMax trait reduce the risk of pod shatter in both standing and swathed crops,” he says. “You can time your swathing or combining so that the majority of the crop has reached maturity, with increased confidence that you’re putting more crop in the bin.”

The HarvestMax trait can now be found in virtually all of Corteva canola varieties whether they be varieties available under the Pioneer or Brevant brands. While there may be a couple of the older varieties without the HarvestMax trait still available, going forward all new Corteva canola varieties will offer pod shatter resistance.

It’s about the whole package

Koscielny points out that while HarvestMax shatter resistance is an important trait on its own, it is only one feature that contributes to optimizing yield when choosing a canola variety.

While Corteva has excellent varieties across the major herbicide tolerance platforms, Roundup Ready, LibertyLink and Clearfield, a new variety under the Pioneer brand P505MSL is an example of where Corteva canola breeders are headed with variety development. 

“P505MSL has the whole package,” says Koscielny. “It has the LibertyLink herbicide tolerance trait, along with an excellent disease resistance package that includes blackleg, sclerotinia, clubroot and fusarium wilt, as well as the HarvestMax trait. From a breeding standpoint, it is a challenge to get all these protector-type features in a new variety while still maintaining excellent yield. It takes more time. But we hope to introduce more varieties that include all of these traits.”

Koscielny says some of the top hybrid canola varieties have the genetic potential to produce 80- to 90-bushel yields, but the western Canadian average — most years, not necessarily in a drought year — is more in the 40- to 50-bushel yield range. 

“As we develop new varieties with more of these crop protector features, such as improved disease resistance and pod shatter resistance, hopefully that will help producers achieve more of that genetic yield potential,” he says. 

While pod shatter resistance has been proven to reduce canola yield losses, it has limits under extreme growing conditions, such as a drought year, Koscielny says. If the canola develops into an extremely thin stand, for example, and plants nearing maturity get whipped around by hot, dry winds, those plants could still experience some degree of pod shatter losses. But, he says, hopefully those growing conditions are rare.

The post Canola traits increase harvest options appeared first on Grainews.

Swathing may be an option if the following occurs:

• Crop canopy is upright and not well knit together
• Uneven crop staging from uneven crop emergence, disease, weedy patches or early season frost
• Risk of early fall frost
• Thin, short or lodged plant stand
• The optimum stage to swath for both yield and quality is 60 per cent seed colour change
  

Delayed swath may be an option if the following occurs:

• You need more time to help spread out the workload (waiting until 80 per cent seed colour change could help, for instance)
• Adverse weather conditions are in the forecast at 60 per cent seed colour change when one would normally swath
• The crop is well-knitted with minimal disease or insect damage
• Risk of early fall frost is low
  

Straight cutting may be an option if the following occurs:

• You seeded a canola variety with the pod shatter resistant trait
• Plants are well-knitted with a slight lean to protect against severe wind events
• Even, uniform crop maturation
• Limited disease, hail or insect damage to plants or pods
• There is a need to balance weather, crop conditions and maturity with your farm’s time efficiency (manpower and machinery)
• Seed moisture is less than 10 per cent with minimal green seed (ideally less than two per cent)
  

Need more information? The Canola Council of Canada provides important tips for harvest management that all canola growers can reference. 

Planning for 2022?

And if you’re looking to the 2022 cropping season with straight cutting canola in mind, the following are some agronomic and management tips to consider:

• Seed early to have the crop reach maturity as early as possible. Select varieties with pod shatter resistance and the best disease resistance package suited to your area.
• Fertilize for high yields and aim for a thick crop.
• Target seven to 10 plants per square foot. A heavier canola stand has a decreased likelihood of shatter from high winds. With increased plants per square foot, you will reduce branching and even out maturity across the field.
• Use excellent weed control to reduce the green material through the combine.
• Yield loss as a result of shatter and pod drop will increase as harvest is delayed. Limit straight cut acres to what is manageable for your operation.
• Target harvest at less than 10 per cent moisture. Canola harvested in the 10 to 15 per cent moisture range will need to be dried.
• To reduce shatter losses, harvest when straw is slightly damp in the early morning or evening.
• If still standing during frost periods, harvest after the first heavy frost.
• The reel may need to be adjusted to minimize shatter. Reel speed should match ground speed.
• Different headers may impact shatter losses.

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A proper crop rotation, a proper variety rotation, a proper herbicide rotation, a proper rotation of seed treatments and fungicides — you name it. If you’re applying some strategy to control or protect your crop from diseases, weeds and insects, then get those plant genetics and chemistries in rotation to keep treatments effective and reduce the risk of the targeted pest developing resistance to the control measure.

Why it matters: Rotate it all: crops, varieties, herbicides, seed treatments and fungicides to keep treatments effective and to reduce the risk of the targeted pest — diseases, weeds or insects — from developing resistance to the control measure.

Figuring out all the angles on rotation can be a complex challenge for farmers say Steve King, canola breeding leader with Corteva based in Guelph, Ont., and Kerry Freeman, Corteva canola category leader based in Calgary, Alta. However, for reducing the risk of clubroot resistance in canola or Group 2 herbicide resistance in weeds, for example, it is worth figuring out.

“And farmers shouldn’t hesitate to ask for help,” says Freeman. Producers have access to consultants, agronomists and retail specialists with thorough product knowledge who can advise on rotations.

“Our staff agronomists and product specialists are familiar with the Corteva portfolio of products and the range of tools that are available. It really comes down to developing a plan for each individual farm and figuring out what strategy is best for your operation. And with a wide range of products and tools available, it can be a complex discussion.”

Rotation suppresses pest numbers

King advocates a holistic approach when it comes to rotations — apply the best rotation possible in all aspects of crop production. He recommends at least a three-year break between canola crops, along with cereals, pulse crops or forages to create an ideal rotation that helps break the disease cycle — it reduces disease buildup and also interrupts the reproduction cycle of other crop pests.

“The wider rotation helps to keep pests at bay,” says King, although he appreciates that for a number of reasons, including economics, it may not always be possible. He says that’s why Corteva also invests in the Pioneer Hybrid and Brevant brand seedlines of hybrid canola, corn, soybeans, wheat, forages and other specialty crops to provide farmers with profitable, rotation-extending, cropping options.

As the global lead of canola breeding programs in Canada and Europe as well as mustard varieties in India, King says one important challenge in breeding work, for example, is to improve genetic resistance to key canola crop diseases, such as clubroot, blackleg and sclerotinia. The objective is to keep pace and hopefully be at least one step ahead of diseases that are always mutating and reinventing themselves.

Using clubroot as an example, Corteva has developed hybrid canola varieties that have resistance to the certain races of clubroot in the first generation of the disease pathogen. “But our breeding program is always working ahead to develop varieties that will have resistance against new races of the disease in the second, third, fourth and fifth generations as the clubroot pathogen mutates,” says King.

Finding genetic material with disease resistance involves expanding the search into some exotic sources of germplasm, he says, and then transferring that genetic resistance into canola. As plant breeders work to develop varieties with improved genetic resistance to leading diseases, they also have to be careful to maintain or potentially improve other desirable traits, such as high yield, high oil quality and agronomic features that make that variety appealing to grow.

Freeman says it is not only important for producers in areas where there is increased risk of clubroot disease to grow resistant varieties, but it can also be a proactive measure against the disease in areas where there is lower risk. Corteva’s goal is to include clubroot resistance in all new lines of canola.

Again, in the spirit of rotation, farmers are advised to rotate canola varieties with different clubroot disease resistance in order to keep that resistance effective against different races of the disease.

Herbicide options

It is a similar approach on the weed control and herbicide resistance front. Corteva is working to develop canola, corn and soybean varieties with herbicide-tolerant traits to different herbicide chemistries, such as glyphosate, LibertyLink and Clearfield. This gives farmers the option to grow top-performing varieties and be able to use herbicides with different active ingredients to control weeds. They can grow a canola variety with tolerance to glyphosate one year, for example, and then switch that up in subsequent years and grow a variety with tolerance to LibertyLink or Clearfield herbicides, which lowers the risk of herbicide-resistant weed development.

On one hand, farmers can rotate the herbicide-tolerant platforms, but they can also use herbicide products with different modes of action to improve weed control efficacy. Prospect is one product from Corteva that’s a combination of the Group 4 and 14 active ingredients halauxifen and carfentrazone. When used ahead of canola as a pre-seed herbicide and tank mixed with glyphosate, it provides effective control against a wide range of weeds including some of the toughest broadleaf weeds — cleavers and hemp-nettle.

*Also coming along from Corteva is a new herbicide-tolerant trait called Optimum Gly, expected to be launched in 2022. With its “advanced glyphosate-tolerant trait technology,” it is described as providing excellent in-crop weed control in canola over a much wider window of application ranging from the cotyledon stage right up to first flower.

Get the crop growing

King says along with all the product and variety rotation, the real foundation to producing a high-quality and high-yielding crop, is a nice even germination that gets vigorously growing seedlings through the soil. And proper seed treatment with an insecticide, such as Lumiderm, that controls flea beetles and wireworm and helps get the crop off to a robust start.

“Along with all the other tools available, that vigorously growing crop will have a much better chance to withstand disease pressure and also compete against weeds,” says King.

Freeman says a unique feature of the Corteva strategy is to provide farmers with a wide range of options not only in herbicide choices, but in variety and disease resistance.

“Looking at the canola portfolio in particular, it is being developed with varieties that work in all herbicide segments — glyphosate-tolerant, LibertyLink and Clearfield systems,” he says. “But plant breeders are also working to develop varieties with improved resistance to clubroot, blackleg and sclerotinia. Our plan is to deploy all those key agronomic traits across all three of the herbicide systems.

“Farmers will really be able to utilize all of the technology while they are rotating between herbicide traits as well as rotating between disease-resistance genes. If a farmer is selecting one herbicide system this year, they will also have access to varieties that work with that system that also have effective clubroot, blackleg and sclerotinia resistance as well.”

*Update: The article was updated to indicate Optimum Gly as a herbicide-tolerant trait.

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BASF

The 2021 BASF Ag Rewards Program helps Canadian farmers build a crop protection plan to grow healthier, higher-yielding crops, while maximizing savings — earning up to 22 per cent in rebates.

For 2021, two new products have been added to the BASF Ag Rewards Program. Teraxxa F4 seed treatment, a new mode of action cereal seed treatment that provides true wireworm control by breaking the lifecycle, has been added. Basagran Forté herbicide, which provides post-emergent control of some of the toughest broadleaf weeds in farmers’ pulse crops has been added to the program. Also new, when participants qualify for the baseline rewards and the InVigor reward, they are also eligible to earn $1 per acre on Liberty.

When planning for the upcoming crop year, the following are a few things to keep in mind:

• Earn up to seven per cent, through baseline rewards, on qualifying products when purchasing a minimum of 300 acres from all three segments.
• To further maximize the Ag Rewards Program, purchase a minimum of 300 acres of Liberty and 300 acres of InVigor. To further qualify, maintain a minimum purchase ration of one jug of Liberty for every two bags of InVigor.
• Earn an additional two per cent through the Multiplier Bonus by purchasing a minimum of 300 acres of two products in the same segment.

BASF has created tools to help plan and count potential rewards, including an online calculator and video overview of the program. Check out the calculator here. Check out the two-minute program overview video here.

Farmers can connect with their local BASF rep or AgSolutions Customer Care at 1-877-371-BASF (2273) for support and to answer any questions.

Corteva Agriscience

Corteva Agriscience calls its producer rebate program Flex+ Rewards. If you max out this program, Corteva will rebate up to 18 per cent on eligible crop protection products. First, find your tier:

• Core: $5,000 to $24,999
• Core Plus: $25,000 – $99,000 or 300 acres of seed
• Plus Max: $100,000 or more, or 800 acres of seed

These spend categories are based on MSRP, not necessarily the price you pay your retailer.

Second, choose products that meet your farm operations’ needs. If you’re in the Core tier choosing products from two categories, your rebate will be three per cent. In the Core Plus tier, you could save up to 10 per cent if you purchase from four categories. The highest tier — Plus Max — allows you to save up to 12 per cent on eligible purchases. The product categories eligible for a rebate are: pre-seed, grass herbicides, broadleaf herbicides, cross-spectrum fungicides and canola and corn herbicides.

Receive another one per cent on your crop protection purchases with the Seed Booster Bonus by purchasing at least 300 acres of Pioneer seed and/or Brevant seed products.

Third, save even more when you commit early. There’s another three per cent rebate if you book with your retailer by March 15, 2021, and an additional two per cent rebate if your product is invoiced and picked up by April 15, 2021. Find the details and full product lists here.

FMC Canada

FMC’s rebate program is called FMC CashBack. Purchase at least $5,000 worth of eligible FMC products between November 1, 2020, and October 31, 2021, and receive up to 15 per cent off of qualifying herbicides.

FMC CashBack rebate tiers are based on spending at MSRP. There are four tiers: $5,000 to $29,999, $30,000 to $49,999, $50,000 to $74,999 and $75,000-plus.

Use products like Aim EC, Express brands, PrecisionPac burnoff blends and FMC insecticides as builders to increase your return. Pre-herbicide rebates range from two to eight per cent and in-crop herbicide rebates range from six to 15 per cent.

Producers can select any product in the FMC portfolio as an entry point to the program, there is no tie to seed or herbicide traits. FMC has one of the lowest dollar value grower program entry points. There are no matching acres, no booking program and no mandatory sign up. With FMC Cashback, producers can choose agronomics and economics in one program. Find the details here.

Nutrien Ag Solutions

Nutrien Ag Solutions and Proven Seed have a rebate program called PV Profits. The program includes crop protection, fertilizer and seed components, giving producers the ability to save across all inputs as a rebate on account. To qualify for rebates through PV Profits, producers need to book qualifying products before specific deadlines.

Producers can earn a rebate of $1.10 per acre on matching seed and nitrogen purchases. When matching Proven Seed Roundup Ready canola or corn with Roundup or Proven Seed LibertyLink canola with Interline producers can save $1.00 per acre. An additional $0.25 per acre can be earned if Shadow herbicide is purchased for extra weed control. Producers that are using Proven Seed TruFlex canola varieties have an opportunity to receive an extra $0.50 per acre on matching Roundup acres if the seed is booked before January 31, 2021.

The crop protection component of the PV Profits Program includes a wide range of products from partner suppliers. By committing to buy 300 acres of Proven Seed canola, cereals, corn, mustard or soybeans before the booking deadline, producers can save between three to five per cent on all qualifying early booked crop protection purchases. The more farmers book and buy, the more they save.

Though some deadlines have already passed, growers can still book and save across crop protection, fertilizer and Proven Seed, only through Nutrien Ag Solutions. Details on all these programs are available through your local Nutrien Ag Solutions retailer.

Syngenta

Qualify for the Syngenta Partner Program by purchasing a minimum $25,000 of eligible Syngenta products, which includes several new products for 2021. There are three main components to the program: the Portfolio Reward, the Soybean Seed Bonus and the Purchase Volume Reward.

Once you meet the $25,000 criteria, receive up to 10 per cent off on matching acres through the Portfolio Reward and save two to six per cent overall on eligible products through the Purchase Volume Reward. Further save an additional $1 to $4 per acre with the Soybean Seed Bonus.

Also, in 2021, save when you take control of your harvest with the Reglone Ion Bonus where you can earn five per cent on all Reglone Ion purchases, based on Partner Program qualifications. Call 1-87-SYNGENTA (1-877-964-3682) or find the details (and the calculator) online.

Bayer Crop Science

In 2021, Bayer Crop Science continues to offer incredible value to producers through the BayerValue Rewards Programs. Program members are also eligible to receive a complimentary one-year subscription to the Climate FieldView platform and up to 50 per cent off the cost of the Climate FieldView hardware (offer applies to a maximum rebate of $2,000 for select hardware purchased on the Climate FieldView order portal only. For full details, click here).

Details for the 2021 BayerValue West Rewards Program (Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and Peace River region of British Columbia) includes the following:

• When farmers purchase a minimum of 300 acres of qualifying seed treatments, herbicides or fungicides, they can save up to 19 per cent.
• With the purchase of a minimum of 300 acres of seed or 600 acres of seed treatment, farmers save up to five per cent on seed treatments, herbicides and fungicides with the Season Starter bonus.
• When farmers treat a minimum of 300 acres of eligible trait canola with Prosper EverGol and Buteo Start, they get an extra two per cent off of their purchases with the Buteo Start bonus.
• Through the Incredible Bayer Offer, farmers who book 1,000 acres of Bayer cereal herbicides by March 12, 2021, can also save up to $2 per acre on eligible products.

Additional savings and information includes the following:

• Potato producers are also eligible for additional savings through the Hot Potato Rewards Program.
• Farmers can calculate their savings with the new 2021 BayerValue Rewards calculator. The easy-to-use calculator requires only a few simple inputs to help producers maximize their savings.
• Producers must be registered by May 1, 2021, to be eligible for BayerValue Rewards Program benefits. Sign up by visiting GrowerPrograms.ca, contacting 1-888-283-6847, or by talking to a local retail or Bayer rep.

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