Ferrie: Give Corn A ‘Big Push’ With Better Nutrient Allocation

Now is a great time to evaluate how your corn crop is doing with the pollination period either underway or just completed. 

In the process, evaluate your nutrient program -- nitrogen especially and also phosphorus -- and how to finetune it for better yield outcomes, advises Ken Ferrie, Farm Journal Field Agronomist.

Earlier this week, Ferrie did two videos in a central Illinois Farm Journal test plot (scroll down to see the second one) to demonstrate the importance of application timing and placement – two features of the 4R strategy of right product, right rate, right time and right place.  

The plot contains a single corn hybrid grown only a few rows apart, no-tilled into bean stubble. While the same total amount of product was used across the plot, two different application placements and timings were used. 

Video 1: Good Corn Yield Potential

In the first video, Ferrie notes that the corn had a nutrient program consisting of a broadcast application in the fall, and the balance of N then was applied at sidedress.

“The corn looks pretty good, the uniformity is good, and it pollinated from butt to tip in about three days,” Ferrie says. “If you looked at just this part of the field, you’d say everything is right on target.”

However, Ferrie says the crop in this part of the plot is actually a week to 10 days behind where it could have been in maturity if the N had been better allocated.

“Any time we stress a plant pre-tassel (with insufficient N), we slow down the pollination window. If we stress the crop post-tassel, we speed up the grain fill. Either scenario can cost us some bushels,” he says.

Video 2: Bin Buster Yield Potential

In the second video (see below), Ferrie is just eight rows away from the location of the first video, but the crop in this part of the plot is further ahead and performing better. Its maturity is approximately seven to 10 days ahead of the crop shown in the first video.

“Both plots were planted at the same, have had the same GDUs and the same amount of rainfall, but they’re having a different outcome,” he says.

What made the huge difference? The application timing and placement of the nitrogen and phosphorus. 

“We're taking that planter pass we're already making and spending some time and money on putting fertility in the furrow,” Ferrie says.  

“In this case it was through the FurrowJet and the wings as well. And then we're also going to use a 2 x 2 placement with some nitrogen. We're trying to give this corn a big push out of the gate and then as it is headed towards tasseling, and that shows up in the maturity here.”

“There is some cost to the starter fertilizer that you put in there, but the nitrogen just comes out of your existing program,” Ferrie says. “You're not putting on extra nitrogen, you're putting on the same amount – just allocating it to the right time and right place in the situation.”

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