Benefits of a System Approach
Success in the field isn’t just reacting to problems as they arise. It comes from taking a thoughtful, system-wide approach from planning to harvest. A system approach means making smart management decisions and applying the right inputs at the right time to give crops a strong start and keep them healthy throughout the season. Following a “Prepare, Plant, Protect” framework helps growers to make smarter choices and to get the most out of every acre.
Prepare: Build the Foundation
Residue & Nutrient Management
Starting a season off strong begins right when the previous season ends. Following harvest, residue left unmanaged in the fields can create challenges the following spring, leading to skips, pest carryover and lost nutrition. Post-harvest treatment with microbial and enzymatic products designed to speed up residue breakdown unlock the nutritional potential of residue and lower skips and disease pressure in the spring.
Streamline Ag’s NGest contains a consortium of microbes belonging to the Bacillus family, elected for their efficacy in speeding up natural decay processes. Take an in-depth look at residue management in our recent blog.
Pre-Season Fertilization Planning
Nitrogen is a critical macronutrient applied to fields each year. However, this essential nutrient can easily undergo volatilization and leaching, leading to loss of valuable crop nutrition and reduced return on investment.
Growers can plan ahead to protect nutrition with the assistance of crop inputs designed to stabilize nitrogen both above and below the ground. It is vital for growers to choose stabilizing inputs which do not cause harm to the soil microbiome. Streamline Ag’s NFit nitrogen stabilizers use chemical reactions to prevent volatilization and leaching while preserving both the naturally occurring microbiome as well as any beneficial biological crop inputs applied throughout the season. Learn more about nitrogen stabilization in our dedicated blog post.
Weed and Pest Forecasting
Looking to the past can helps growers to prepare for the future. Be sure to review previous seasons’ weed escapes and herbicide performance to identify problems which need to be addressed by hybrid and herbicide selections, along with other management practices.
If insect pressure led to severe quality and yield losses, be sure to make hybrid selections and management plans to address those pressures. Also leverage available tools such as regional pest forecasting, bulletins and information from local extension offices and other models to predict potential insect pressures.
Making plans before the season begins allows growers to avoid the costs of yield loss and expensive in-season “rescue treatments.”
Plant: Set Crops Up Right
Seed Selection & Planting at Correct Rates
Choosing the right seed is one of the most important decisions growers make each year. Using a strong system approach means looking at each field individually and matching hybrids and traits to specific conditions, factoring in soil types, drainage and historical yield data. Relative maturity plays a role, and balancing yield potential with planting and harvest timing is essential.
Traits and tolerances matter just as much as yield potential. Growers should take care to select hybrids with the correct insect and herbicide tolerances for the expected pressures in fields. While crop inputs offer valuable tools in maximizing on yield potential, thoughtful seed selection sets the stage for healthier crops to maximize the return on every crop input throughout the growing season.
Seed Treatments
Harnessing the power of seed treatments, growers can protect against early disease and provide early nutritional benefits the moment seeds begin to germinate. With the right planter box treatment, growers can boost emergence uniformity, build robust root structures, achieve strong stand establishment and avoid yield losses from disease damage.
These early-season benefits carry through beyond early emergence into the rest of the season, leading all the way up to harvest. This summer, Streamline Ag embarked on the Pro Farmer Crop Tour, where across the country we saw firsthand the difference our planter box and seed treatments made in root vigor and crop productivity.
Streamline Ag offers seed treatments with proven results. Fortify Soybean Seed treatment offers strong protection against some of the most damaging diseases, which you can learn more about here. HomeStead planter box treatments offer a tailored approach to early-season nutrition and protection, with microbial consortiums specially selected to help specific crops.
Nutrition at Planting
At planting, providing crops with targeted nutrition can give seedlings a stronger start and improve early-season vigor. Crop Inputs containing vital nutrients in addition to enzymes, such as Streamline Ag’s UpZyme and CropFit ZincUp, offer a unique advantage by addressing and correcting nutrient deficiencies, while enhancing nutrient availability in the soil by breaking down hard-to-digest polysaccharide chains and soil lipids. The nutrient-rich soil environments created provide an early-season boost to young germinating seeds
Protect: Safeguard Your Investment
In-Season Nutrition
Following a strong start to the season, maintaining crop health through harvest requires timely in-season nutrition to support key stages of development. By supplying essential nutrients when plants need them most, crop inputs support strong root systems, robust vegetative growth and reproductive development. Timely nutrition goes beyond correcting deficiencies and is instead about sustaining vigor, protecting yields and maximizing overall crop performance.
Streamline Ag’s CropFit product line includes inputs that provide valuable in-season nutrition, including Nitrogen, Potassium, Sulfur, Boron and Molybdenum. These balanced formulations provide important ingredients to support chlorophyl formation, cell wall stability and efficient use of Nitrogen throughout the growing season.
Pest & Disease Management
Protecting crops from pests and disease is the most powerful when staying ahead of the curve by anticipating pressures and making smart hybrid choices ahead of planting. However, it is still important to consistently scout fields to identify any emerging pest or disease issues. When scouting reveals insect feeding or disease lesions, acting quickly is key to preserving as much yield potential as possible. For some insects, timely insecticide applications may be able to slow population growth before economic thresholds are exceeded. For some fungal diseases, foliar fungicides, such as PerigrineFX* and BioVax*, available from Streamline Ag, applied at the right growth stage can protect healthy tissues and slow the spread.
*Pending EPA Registration
Weed Control
Weeds compete directly with crops for sunlight, water and nutrients, which makes early, well-rounded control essential. It’s critical to match herbicide programs with the hybrids or varieties planting. Herbicide tolerant traits allow growers to safely and confidently apply herbicides to protect their fields, but only when the correct genetics are in place.
Tank mix partners play a key role in weed management programs by improving application consistency and accuracy to ensure the most efficient and effective knockdown and suppression of present and emerging weeds. These tank mix partners may also pay attention to stewardship, keeping herbicides on-target and reducing drift. Streamline Ag’s OptiFit tank mix partners are approved for use with a variety of widely-used herbicides and are designed to improve accuracy, coverage and canopy penetration.
Building Resilience
No growing season is free of abiotic stress, whether from heat, drought, excess moisture or sudden weather swings. Thoughtful seed selection, timely use of crop inputs and other management efforts can help to protect crops from these stressors. Genetics with proven tolerance to drought or stress conditions can provide a stronger foundation, while stress mitigation inputs help plants maintain vigor during critical growth stages.
Streamline Ag’s CropFit Complete is specifically formulated to shield crops from the impact of abiotic stresses and to protect yield potential. By using micronutrients to improve plant health during critical growth stages while protecting against stressors with regulators and antioxidants, growers see reduced yield loss under abiotic stress.
Not One Product, Not One Decision
A successful season isn’t about one single hybrid or one single crop input. It’s the sum of smart, timely decisions taken throughout the year, from the end of one harvest to the beginning of the next.
Following a systems approach doesn’t need to be overwhelming. Streamline Ag breaks down our approach into three simple steps: Prepare, Plant and Protect, to make planning your crop input decisions easier. Growers who work with Streamline Ag products aren’t alone! Contact your local dealer to build a customized system approach for your fields.
