Crop Watch: no need to rush nitrogen fertiliser

Most cereal and oilseed rape crops are coming out of the winter looking well, so there is no need to rush on with fertiliser, according to the first reports from FWi’s team of agronomists after the winter break.

Prime Agriculture’s Andrew Blazey said even wheat crops that looked backward going into winter now looked lush in many cases and early nitrogen applications to consecutive wheats could wait until the end of the month.

“Like wheats, oilseed rape crops should be actively growing before N applications are started in order for it to be used efficiently and prevent leaching of what is now a costly input,” he said.

David Cairns from Northumberland-based McCreath, Simpson & Prentice also said many crops had sufficient tillers, so growers should not to rush on with fertiliser, except on backward crops.

But while the mild winter had helped crops put on good early growth, it had also sparked some concern that diseases could increase. “Wheats appear to be relatively clean, but I do expect high levels of inoculum to be present,” Mr Cairns said.

“There are small amounts of mildew and net blotch to be found on winter barley.”

Phoma had started to reappear on oilseed rape crops treated last October/ November in southern counties, ProCam’s Nick Brown said. “Crops will be treated shortly, the current high prices making it easy to justify a late second treatment.”

In Devon, Neil Potts said differing canopy sizes – within the same field – meant oilseed rape fertiliser and fungicides would be very tricky to manage this spring.

“There is much talk of another brown rust epidemic in wheat this year, but at the moment there is little evidence of inoculum in crops,” he added. “Even Alchemy is rust-free, but is in places showing good levels of mildew infection.”

To read any of the reports in full, click on the links above, or select one of the following regions:

North (David Cairns)

East (Andrew Blazey)

South (Nick Brown)

West (Neil Potts)

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