McCain Foods Green Beans

Planting

Dwarf green beans for McCain Foods were planted in all treatments on the 28th of December. All treatments were planted in beans, Conventional and Hybrid treatments ex. peas, and the Regen treatment ex. cover crop/fallow. All treatments were disc ripped and rolled one month before planting and regrowth sprayed out four days before planting.

We applied different rates of starter fertiliser to each treatment. In the Hybrid and Regen treatments we added a biological seed treatment. All treatments had the same bean variety planted at the same rate. We are grateful to our good friends at Nicolle Contracting for their patience when planting the trial.

As always, we are measuring lots of thing over the growing season. For the beans, we have been particularly interested in canopy cover, soil nitrogen availability, pest and disease pressure, yield and of course, gross margins.

Canopy Cover

We measure canopy cover percentage weekly using the Canopeo app. There was little difference in the treatments until early Feb when the Regen treatment took off, and canopy size increased at a faster rate. This treatment is visibly taller and ground cover is greater than the other two treatments.

The Hybrid treatment has lagged, probably due to some early slug damage. When the pea vine was disced, some residue remained on the surface, a perfect spot for slugs to hang out. We applied slug bait to all treatments to reduce further damage.

Disease Presence

The main disease issue we are worried about in beans is sclerotinia. We have so far applied one protectant fungicide to each treatment to protect against sclerotinia, as well as botrytis (different products depending on treatment).

Earlier in February we noted that there was young leaves wilting, most prominently in the Conventional and Hybrid treatments, however was apparent to a lesser degree in the Regen. A thorough inspection by Ben Prebble (McCain Foods) and Shelley Bath (Horticentre) concluded that we were starting to see signs of fusarium. Diagnosis was through the presence of brown/purple, woody lower stems. Phosphorus acid application is planned to treat the fusarium as soon as we have an appropriate spray window.

Pest Presence

A common pest insect in beans is looper caterpillar. Standard McCain Foods practice is to apply an insecticide to knock out caterpillars, when a fungicide is being applied. There are two active ingredients that can be used, neither of which are friendly to beneficial insects/natural enemies. Early in the month we saw some suspected signs of caterpillar chewing, however there are no threshold values to use to trigger spray applications. The Conventional treatment had an insecticide applied (Karate Zeon), however we held off in the other two treatments, as there were no clear signs of damage.

A leaf damage survey was completed following this, which understandably found more damage in the Regen & Hybrid than in Conventional, however still not visually a huge amount of damage. A few caterpillars have been found. We have been recommended a biological alternative, BioBit (Bacillus thuringiensis), which will kill caterpillars but not any eggs. We will likely need more than 1 application, to control the next hatched caterpillars. BioBit will be applied in the next spray window.

Nitrogen Management

We have been closely following nitrate nitrogen levels in the soil. The chart below shows nitrate-N in the top 30 cm from when the Conventional and Hybrid cover crops were sprayed out, through to mid Feb.

Nitrate-N in the Regen treatment has been increasing steadily since the cover crop was mulched in early October. The levels in the Hybrid treatment have been higher than the Conventional since harvest. This is likely due to most of the residue being baled and removed in the Conventional, vs retained and incorporated in the Hybrid.

A typical bean program includes a side dressing of fertiliser which includes nitrogen. A leaf test in early Feb found that nutrient levels were good in all treatments. In discussion with Mark Redshaw (Yara), we decided that because the canopy in the Conventional and Hybrid was less developed than the Regen, these treatments would receive a late application of nitrogen despite tests saying levels were satisfactory. The intent was to give these treatments a boost ahead of harvest.

The Conventional treatment had 200kg/ha of Nitrabor applied, the Hybrid a half rate of 100kg/ha. The Regen is to receive a foliar nutrient application of Croplift to maintain canopy health and this will also be applied to the Hybrid.

Application was completed via Airborne Solutions drone, to apply accurately over plots.

Next Steps

We are approx. 2 – 3 weeks away from harvest, with a target harvest date of 6th of March. Hand harvests will be completed to determine yield, followed by machine harvest.

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Going to the Vegetables Big Day Out in Pukekohe was an amazing opportunity for me to meet people and to learn more about the research and innovation taking place in the vegetable industry.

Being able to see the biodiversity strips, native plant pods (insectaries), and cover crops that are a part of “A Lighter Touch”, then hearing about the differences they are seeing with all three working together was a highlight for me. LandWISE also has native insectaries and has planted biodiversity strips alongside our annual cover crops. It was interesting to hear Howe (Balle Brothers’ crop manager) talk about how he expected they would have to spray an insecticide due to an increased number of aphids. However, they left it for two weeks, and the aphid numbers dropped as the beneficial insects controlled the aphid population without the need for insecticides.

Water quality was a major topic of conversation in many courses I did at university. Therefore, it was very interesting to hear about the cultural indicator tool for water quality monitoring. It is used in evaluating the current state of waterways, as well as determining actions needed to improve the water quality. For me this talk also reinforced how important it is for Mātauranga Māori and science to be integrated.

I also enjoyed listening to the career session for students. It was interesting to hear how everyone ended up in horticulture and why they enjoy it. I particularly liked hearing about the experiences and successes of other young women in the industry.

Thank you, Vegetable Industry Centre of Excellence (VICE), for hosting the Vegetables Big Day Out. It was great to be able to attend such an insightful and interactive event. I would also like to say thank you for giving me a VICE internship, as part of which I will be doing Slakes aggregate stability testing and nitrate testing with a Nitrachek device.

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Earlier this year we learnt of an interesting project focusing on increasing biodiversity on vegetable farms. The aim of this joint project between A Lighter Touch, Vegetables NZ and Onions NZ is to reduce pest insects in crops by increasing the abundance of beneficial insects on vegetable farms, therefore reducing the need for insecticides.

Two suggested approaches for increasing biodiversity caught our attention. Over the last six months, we have been exploring their implementation at the MicroFarm. We are enormously grateful to Olivia Prouse for supporting our biodiversity journey so far. We are also grateful to Richard Mills from Summerfruit NZ for leading the way in Hawke’s Bay, and showing us the importance of just giving something a go! We also extend our gratitude to other growers engaging in this initiative, who have been sharing their experiences.

Mobile Insectaries

Mobile insectaries (moveable pods) aim to provide a source of shelter, nectar, alternative hosts and pollen (SNAP) for beneficial insects. The concentrated areas of SNAP support natural enemies, which can aid in pest control in vegetable crops. The moveable pods can be moved in and out of crops easily during the year.

Following the detailed ‘how to’ guide provided by ALT, with additional support from Olivia Prouse for plant selection, we built four moveable pods. Each pod has native five plants, all selected to flower at different times of the year. The species selected were mainly plants that had small flowers to provide habitat to small predatory wasps and other small insects which cannot feed on large flowers like commonly grown manuka.

We have been monitoring the pods to see what is flowering each month. While there is some maintenance required for weeding and watering, all plants survived the winter and are thriving this spring. We are excited to have species like Pimelea mimosa, which is a native daphne, naturally found only on Te Mata peak, and to have two species of Muehlenbeckia, which provides a food source for NZ native copper butterfly.

Annual Flower Strips

The aim adding annual flowering strips to a farm is to enhance above ground diversity. Again, this increases the diversity of natural pest insect enemies, providing additional pest control.

At the MicroFarm, we had two specific areas that made for good candidates for annual planting strips. The first is along our driveway, an area which is normally sprayed year-round for weeds. The second is under the irrigator guide cable, another area that gets sprayed, particularly in the spring and summer when the irrigator is running.

Using the ‘how to’ guide from ALT, we have planted a variety of annual flowers in these areas to see what might be suitable. In late September, we planted nine 10 m long plots of annual flowers, each with different combinations of species planted. The rest will planted by early December. We have been monitoring what is growing and what is flowering, and are excited to see insects present and a range of different colored flowers along the driveway.

What’s next?

We continue to monitor the moveable pods and annual flowering strips. We hope that our late plantings will persist through the summer and autumn. While not formally part of our main Carbon Positive project, it is a nice supplementary demonstration. We hope to showcase the ALT guides and provide some regional information about what may be suitable to grow (annuals and perennials) here in Hawke’s Bay. Read more about our journey in the latest A Lighter Touch newsletter here!

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When the Carbon Positive project began, most of the Operations Advisory Group probably thought “six years = six crops”. Certainly, the focus for the operations group has been on the summer crop(s). A lot of energy has been put into getting the operations right for each treatment. Our winter cover crops, initially thought to be just something that happens between cash crops, have turned out to be more important than expected. We are now seeing the project as growing twelve or thirteen crops in six years!

What to plant?

First off, what should we plant? I don’t think we have yet got our cover crop mixes quite right. This year, our hybrid and regen treatments were planted in a diverse mix of 7 species (black oats, tillage radish, vetch, buckwheat, sunflowers, crimson clover and Persian clover). This was to get lots of plant diversity over the winter.

A frost in May killed the buckwheat and sunflowers, which meant they weren’t present over the winter. We planted tillage radish as it is supposed to be the “crowbar of the soil” and will break through tillage pans. Unfortunately, our radishes knew better, hit the pan and, in some areas, popped themselves 10cm out of the ground. This is potentially an issue for both the hybrid and the regen treatments, as chunks of radish could be picked up by the harvester and end up at the factory which may be a problem for product contamination.

Additionally, the radish started to flower and was beginning to set seed, so radish if unmanaged, could have become be a new weed species for us.

In this conversation, there is the question of how much plant diversity do we need? Some of the species we are using, might be okay in a pastoral grazing scenario, but could be hard to manage in a cropping system and therefore become a weed for us. In the systems we are looking at, are we able to select fewer plants, that provide functional diversity, without adding added complexity of to the management of the cover crop?

Another consideration is disease carry over. We intentionally avoided planting tic beans this year, as they could carry unwanted diseases into the following legume crops. Tic beans may be an option ahead of other crops.

Do we graze?

One of the five regenerative principles is to integrate livestock, which we have not yet done in our Regen treatment. However we have grazed our Conventional treatment, which might seem a bit backwards. It is common for Heretaunga Plains growers to plant an annual ryegrass over the winter and graze it with lambs, so we are including sheep in our Conventional treatment.

In the last two years, we wanted to use the cover crop as a mulch on the surface for our main crop to keep the soil surface covered, another of our regenerative principles. If we have a mulch on the soil surface, we hope it will significantly reduce the need for herbicides. To do this effectively, we need to grow a lot of biomass, and therefore don’t want to have sheep or cattle grazing it. We don’t really have a long enough winter growing season to do both. This is where we find tension between some of the regen principles when applied to an annual cropping system. We might yet include livestock; however, we aren’t sure what this will look like in practice.

In addition, lambs can do considerable soil damage over the winter. The photos below show the difference between grazing for a couple of weeks in dry conditions and grazing over a wet weekend this winter.

When to terminate?

Ahead of the tomato planting last year, we had a cover crop of oats, vetch and lupins in the Regen treatment. You may remember that we planned to use a modified tomato planter, which transplants seedlings directly into a mulched cover crop, eliminating the need for both cultivation and herbicides. Just before planting, we met two problems with this plan.

The first issue was that the cover crop was still actively growing and sucking moisture out of the soil, so the soil was very dry in the regen treatment. This led to large, blocky clumps of soil forming in the top 10cm of the profile. The second issue was that the timing of maturity wasn’t right for mulching and killing the oats. In a test area of cover crop, we found the oats regrow, and we had very limited herbicide options to deal with this. It might have worked if we had waited a couple of weeks, however we were working with a factory schedule and had a planting date that wasn’t very flexible.

We want to apply lessons from that experience this year. We are already seeing low soil moisture levels and low nitrate levels in the Regen treatment. To manage the amount of biomass we have grown, and stop the flowering radish from seeding, the cover crop was mulched on the 1st of October. We expect the mulching will not kill the oats, and that we will need to manage regrowth.

How to terminate?

We planted a winter cover crop, it has grown all winter, so what next? Our Operations Advisory Group is having an ongoing discussion on how we terminate it in our Regen treatment. The initial plan was to use a roller crimper, but the consensus is that this is probably not quite the right tool for the job. We have since mulched the cover crop, but we will need another action to terminate it (oats weren’t mature enough). We have two options; we either spray out the oat regrowth or we cultivate to bury the residue.

This is an important conversation for us, as the use of glyphosate is not widely accepted by the Regenerative community. But our discussions with no-till or minimum tillage growers, and some of the Canterbury regenerative croppers, show it is an important tool for successfully reducing or eliminating cultivation. Most of the literature indicates that cultivating is the number one thing to avoid if we want to increase soil carbon, which is the main metric in this trial.

Weed management is a key consideration in beans as there are few herbicide options. If the crop is too weedy it won’t be harvested. If we cultivate, we will have to manage weeds through a suite of other herbicides that have the potential to as harmful as, or worse than glyphosate when compared using the Environmental Impact Quotient.

How do we best minimise soil disturbance? Both cultivation and herbicide use fall into the category of soil disturbance. The question for our operations group comes down to what is the ‘lesser of two evils’- glyphosate or cultivation?

More questions than answers!

A key lesson from the last two years, is that cover crops are important. We have also found that cover crop management is quite complex. There are a lot of questions we need to ask ourselves:

The post Lessons from two years of winter cover crops appeared first on LandWISE - Promoting sustainable land management.

LandWISE Project Manager Alex Dickson discusses some of her thoughts on Regenerative Agriculture after her trip to Europe in June.

As I grapple with my own understanding of Regenerative Agriculture (RA), a trip to Europe was just the thing I needed to provide me with more questions than answers!

1. What are the right policy tools to support both sustainable food production and growers making a livelihood?
2. How does RA scale to go beyond a ‘buzz word’ to have a meaningful impact on the environment?
3. What role do large corporations play in the transition to Regen Ag?

EU Green Deal- Farm to Fork Policy

In 2020 the European Union introduced the Farm to Fork (FTF) policy as part of the EU Green Deal. The policy aims to rethink the whole food value chain, minimise the environmental impact of food production, improve resource efficiency and enhance biodiversity.

Targets set by the FTF include:

• 50% reduction in the use and risk of chemical pesticides by 2030
• 50% reduction in nutrient losses, while ensuring no deterioration in soil fertility by 2030
• 20% reduction in fertiliser use by 2030
• 50% reduction in the sales of antimicrobials for farmed animals and aquaculture by 2030
• 25% of total farmland to be farmed organically by 2030 (9.9% of farmed area was under organic farming in 2021).

These are ambitious targets. In response to these targets, European businesses of all sizes are having to rethink what ‘the system’ looks like in the future and how they fit into food production not only in the face of environmental policy like the FTF, but also in a changing natural environment.

“Regenerative practices are for the future, not for today”

A quote by Tony Salas (founder of Shared X, Peru) at the 2024 IFAMA Conference in a session dedicated to discussing the future Regenerative Agriculture. Shifting from conventional growing methods to regenerative methods shifts the focus from yield, to the management of a functional ecosystem with an emphasis on healthy soils.

Salas reflected on the challenges that the Organic Agricultural movement has had in scaling globally, in 2021 only about 1.6% of total agricultural land was managed organically, and in global food sales organic produce accounted for 1-2%. Such challenges include regulatory barriers, reduced yields, market and distribution challenges and lower profitability.

So what should the regenerative system approach be? How do we scale RA to improve ecosystem and soil health, AND ALSO feed a growing global population, meet increasingly stringent regulatory targets and provide farmers and growers with a good income? Three key points stood out;

1. Focus on adopting a continuous improvement model (Plan>Do>Check>Act) at all stages of the food-value chain
2. Develop flexible standards and avoid exclusive certification
3. Actions must be underpinned with a focus of minimising agricultures contribution to climate change.

“From ‘producing more with less’ to ‘producing more and restoring more’.”

A comment from Kai Wirtz from Bayer, one of the worlds largest agri-chemical companies. Bayer are putting Regenerative Agriculture (RA) at the heart of their company, with a vision to restore nature, and scale regenerative agriculture. They believe that it is possible to grow more using regenerative practices. Their sustainability commitments include reducing GHG emissions per kilogram of crop by 30%, reducing the environmental impact of crop protection by 30%, and supporting 100 million smallholder farms in low and middle-income countries.

Bayer has a global footprint, and they see their portfolio of products and technologies being integrated into regenerative agricultural systems, taking a multi-crop/multi-season approach to farming. This portfolio includes biologicals, crop protection, advanced seed breeding and digital tools.

“Regenerative agriculture is not a destination but a path”

I have arrived home with more questions than answers.

Europe appears to be leaning into regenerative agriculture in a big way, in response to not only stricter environmental policy, but also in what seems to be reasonably genuine concern for the future of the planet and our collective ability to feed a growing population. Large companies (like Bayer) are positioning themselves in the market to support growers in implementing regenerative practices to suit their individual farm systems in countries around the world. We see this in platforms like the Sustainable Agricultural Initiative (SAI), who have signed on over 180 global companies, with the shared goal of transforming agricultural practice for a more sustainable future.

Back in New Zealand, I wonder if we are taking regenerative agriculture serious enough? There are many unknowns, we don’t really know how RA works in NZ farm systems (though we are trying to find out) and change is scary – I find that in our own project. However, I think we know enough to have a go, to start exploring ways of improving management practice to restore ecosystem and soil health.

How do we scale regenerative agriculture in a way that we have meaningful impact on restoring the environment? How do we access the technologies being developed overseas to support change? What does the future of market access look like if we don’t adapt? What does the future of our environment look like if we don’t start to look after our soils?

Or to put it more positively, what does the future look like if we do start to look after our soils? What are the possibilities?

Some other interesting business to explore

• Koppert– Global biological company
• Biobest– Sustainable crop management
• Kimitec– Biotechnology company
• Biorizon– Biotechnology company

The post More questions than answers – Regenerative Ag appeared first on LandWISE - Promoting sustainable land management.

Many thanks to everybody involved in our 2024 Annual Conference! All up we had 99 registrants who heard from 23 amazing presenters and saw 9 different practical demonstrations. Our special thanks to everyone who contributed by sharing their knowledge and experiences, and to delegates for their active interaction. Thanks to Pure Catering and our hosts at the Havelock North Function Centre and at the Centre for Land and Water which hosts our MicroFarm and the demonstrations.

Many thanks also to our conference sponsors and supporters. These organisations support us through the year as well as for the conference and we are very grateful. They are the most loyal of partners we could hope for.

Ka mau te wehi!

The post Rebuilding Our Soils – Successful Conference appeared first on LandWISE - Promoting sustainable land management.

LandWISE 2024 – Rebuilding Our Soils

Havelock North – 15-16 May 2024

We are looking forward to our annual conference this week.
We will report on our current work with industry, researchers and growers
seeking out and trialing best ways to rebuild soil.
Our invited speakers will present alternative practices and novel ideas,
some perhaps fringe, but all looking to be mainstream, on a range of topics.

The key topics in 2024 are:

Carbon Positive – Regenerative Cropping
Alternative Pest Management
A year on – Cyclone impacts
Data capture to understanding
New Zealand Agritech
Novel Technologies

We welcome presenters old and new and are most excited by
the breadth and depth of knowledge they offer on many topics.
We also have a great range of practical demonstrations lined up for
viewing at the MicroFarm.

The draft programme is available now, and registrations are open.

Draft Programme

Our Presenters

Registration

We are delighted that Apatu Group is continuing their sponsorship
to allow secondary students free conference attendance, and that
for 2024 they have been joined by Vegetables NZ and Onions NZ
so an even larger cohort can attend.

We view this as a vital element, as such students are indeed the future of our industry,
and feedback from previous years has been very positive.

Discount for our Financial Members = pay for one day, get the other free. See you there!

Thanks to BASF Crop Protection and Hawke’s Bay Regional Council for continuing their Platinum Sponsorships. Both are long-term, loyal supporters and we are most grateful. Our other loyal supporters are also back with us, so please take time to look and give them your support in return.

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Presentations at the LandWISE Conference “Rebuilding Our Soils”

In the summer of 2023-2024, the LandWISE MicroFarm grew process tomatoes for Heinz-Wattie’s using three alternative management systems: conventional, regenerative, and a hybrid taking from each. One of the principles for a regenerative system is to build natural resilience rather than rely only on a chemical-based crop protection regime. Nothing new, of course, we’ve had IPM programmes for decades.

How can we apply these concepts in an intensive process vegetable crop production system? What are the elements we need to consider, and how do we bring them together? There are tried and proven approaches, there are ongoing developments, and there are new ways that are being explored. Come to the LandWISE Conference “Rebuilding Our Soils” and hear what experts have to say!

Bruce Mackay, Heinz Wattie’s agricultural manager, has been an agronomist for a long time and has seen and tried different growing philosophies in a commercial context. As a key partner in Carbon Positive, Wattie’s has been deeply involved since Day Zero, and doubly so through the 2023-24 cropping season as we’ve worked to integrate regenerative agriculture principles into an intensive crop programme. Why is Kraft-Heinz interested at a global level? Why is Heinz-Wattie’s investing in local research?

Tika Schellevis started working on assessment of regen ag practices in Canada as part of her master’s degree in climate studies at Wageningen University. Over the last two years, Tika has been part of McCain Foods’ Regen Ag journey. Since October 2023, Tika has been working with the McCain Foods agronomy team in Timaru. Tike will outline how the Environmental Impact Quotient, EIQ, can help understand the relative impacts of different agrichemical options, and help select an optimal programme.

Jessica Vereijssen will discuss integrated pest management, using our crops as examples, but presenting transferable principles. She leads the Insect Dynamics, Ecology, and Sustainability team at Plant & Food Research in Lincoln. Jessica specialises in Integrated Pest Management and sustainable management programmes, considering the biology, behaviour, and ecology of pests. Her current research delves into (invasive) insect vectors such as psyllids and aphids, as well as the potential transmission of plant pathogenic organisms, leveraging her dual background in entomology and plant pathology. 

Chris Thompson will describe the use of predatory insects. He is a seasoned professional in the biotechnology industry, and Managing Director of Bioforce, where he leads the development of sustainable agricultural products and environmentally friendly solutions for various industries. When we received a “bag of bugs” to help control Tomato Potato Psyllid, he’s who we rang with twenty questions. Where do we put them? What agrichemicals might be OK? Which ones should we avoid at all costs? etc.

Since we began the Carbon positive project, we’ve been introduced to a huge range of products described variously as crop elicitors, bioactives, biostimulants, natural protectors and more. Tony Reglinski is a Senior Research Scientist at Plant and Food Research where he investigates the use of plant defence inducers to enhance natural resistance against pathogen attack. His research has covered a broad range of crops including, cereal, radiata pine, wine grapes and kiwifruit. His aim is to is to improve our understanding of the benefits and potential limitations of inducers in order to facilitate their practical implementation as crop protectants.

Come along and hear these experts as they lay out options to increase our resilience and reduce reliance on single approaches to crop protection. The principles and concepts apply broadly, so there wil be gold nuggets regardless of your crop interests!

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Examples and discussions for horticulture and cropping

Sustainable production through technology has been one of the key themes through the history of LandWISE Inc. We started with minimum tillage and strip tillage equipment, then rapidly adopted RTK GPS and autosteer, which we saw unlocked many opportunities for financial and environmental gains. We’ve looked a precision viticulture, canopy monitoring, crop mapping, soil sensing and more. We investigated agricultural robotics and options for management software. So much stuff to keep up with!

The 2024 LandWISE Conference has three components dedicated to agritech: an innovation panel discussing the experience of taking an idea to commercial reality, a group presenting technologies that automate data collection and help make sense of it all to support management decision making, and a practical in-paddock session where equipment will be demonstrated.

In the session, “Commercialising New Technology”, Andrew Cameron will chair a discussion between Tim Neale from Data Farming, Matt Flowerday from Landkind, Clare Bradley from Agrisea NZ, Hamish Penny from Croptide, and Richard Beaumont from AGOVOR. Different people, different technologies, different growth paths and different insights.

“Data Capture and Understanding” builds on the agritech theme, presenting technologies to capture data remotely and turn it into information to assist management. Tim Neale’s DataFarming platform presents satellite data and interpretations, Matt Flowerday capture aerial imagery and has a platform to plan farm management spatially, Hamish Penny and Croptide have a “smartwatch” for plants, collecting internal water status information and sending it straight to your phone, and Lia Willis helps clients pull different layers of data together.

The Horizons Regional Council Practical Session at the MicroFarm will display technologies and give opportunity to discuss details with the people with answers. Look for drones and robots from Airborne Solutions, AGOVOR and Robomate, cover crops and roller crimpers, pest predators with Bioforce and new irrigation technology from WaterForce!

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The Carbon Positive tomato crop has now been growing for 13 weeks. Our estimated harvest date is the 5th March, so just under six weeks remaining until harvest. All treatments have had a good fruit set and are reasonably disease free (minus a small amount of bacterial speck). We are on track for a good result at harvest. There are visual differences between the treatments. The conventional treatment has a dense canopy, the regenerative treatment has a more open canopy and the fruit is more exposed. The hybrid is somewhere in between. Management for the month of January has included three spray applications, two irrigations and one granular fertiliser application. More on this below.

Canopy Development Week 2 – 13

Pest Management

In mid-January we started to see holes appearing in tomatoes, caused by corn ear worm/tomato fruit worm. The first insecticide application we used (Benevia) is registered for chewing insects, so caterpillars were targeted early in the season. However, subsequent insecticides have predominantly targeted sucking insects (psyllid/thrips/aphids/whitefly). We applied Uphold (spinetoram) across all treatments to control fruit worm. The crop was inspected five days after application, and found no active caterpillars. Additionally, we still haven’t seen any psyllid on the sticky traps in the field, which is positive!

Nutrient Management

We have been regularly monitoring soil nitrate levels using the Nitrate Quick Test method. Nitrate levels have been declining since side dressing, which indicates that plant demand is exceeding supply of nitrogen. Fruit set has been good and we want to ensure there is enough energy in the canopy to increase fruit size (and yield).

Additionally, we have been doing monthly leaf tests to look at nutrient levels in the tomato leaves. There have been signs of leaf rolling, and purpling along the leaf margins in all treatments in January. This was more distinct in the Regen treatment. This is an indication of low phosphorus or potassium causing plant stress.

Leaf tests showed lower than optimum Nitrogen percentages in the leaf for this stage in the season, as well as low P and K percentages (graph below showing N%). The Operations Advisory Group decided to apply a late application of fertiliser across all treatments. The Regenerative treatment has appeared stressed compared to the other treatments in recent weeks. There has been concern as to whether the canopy is big enough to size the fruit already set. The OAG used the information available to make a justified ‘grower decision’ to address the apparent nutrient deficiencies.

Nitrogen concentrations in the leaf were lower in the Regen treatment than the other two treatments, so we decided to apply a higher rate of N, to support the plants to harvest. The OAG decided to apply YaraRega 9-0-27.5. The Conventional and Hybrid treatment had 9kg N and 27.5kg K applied (100kg/ha). The Regen treatment had 18kg N and 55kg K applied (200kg/ha). This is somewhat counter intuitive for the Regen treatment, however all of the treatments have now received the same amount of N, around 90kgN/ha. Even with this application the Regen plots have had much less potassium applied compared to the other two treatments.

Drone Application

Fertiliser applied late in the season is normally done using a tractor mounted spreader. However, because our plots are 12m wide, we are unable to get the desired spread width this way. We worked with Airborne Solutions to apply the fertiliser with their drone, to be more targeted with our application, plus avoids damaging the plants by driving over with a ground spreader. The spread of the product was uniform and spread to the 12m width of our plots. The drone carries 40kg of product so was a quick job to get done on our 1.5ha.

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