Starter Considerations

Let's face it, we in Ontario are in a bind. With the higher fertilizer prices and bigger yeilds over the last few years we are on average taking more P&K out of our soils than we are putting back in. If you did any soil sampling last fall, you may have had a shock when you looked at the results. Province wide, 31% of soil tests are critical for P and 49% are critical for K. We've spent the savings, now it's time to start making some deposits again.

So how do we do that in an economical way? With less fields having an available source of livestock manure, it is expected that we will see a decline in values and a shift to the sufficiancy fertilizer program rather than the build and maintain program of past years. The problem is, to simply broadcast sufficiancy amounts of P&K on critical level soils, you are probably not going to see an economic response. A starter fertilizer needs to be placed for the seedling to use it, and K included if levels are low. The remainder of the fertilizer needed can be broadcasted.

In the last few years, Greg Stewart has done a fair bit of research on critical testing soils (>12 PPM P and >120 PPM K). You can google his research online, but to sum it up - at P&K soil test levels, a granular P&K blend of something like 5-20-20 at 200lb/ac in a 2x2 band is going to give you the biggest yield increase. Followed by 75lb/ac Map only or 5 gal 6-24-6.

Take it a step further and start considering pH and Zinc levels. If your pH is high, the addition of Zinc Sulphate into your dry starter will lower the pH in the band. By lowering the pH, the phosphorous will become more available to the seedling and the micronutrient Zinc will be more available in the band than broadcast. You can also add Zinc to your 6-24-6, however, make sure it is compatible prior to mixing. Also, liquid zinc is more expensive than the dry.

It's Feb 27th - who knows, we could be planting corn in a month and you'll need to have your starter ready! Stranger things have happened.