Don Wiebe installed 25 Y-drop units on the 60-foot boom of his John Deere 4830 sprayer on 30-inch centres
“After two years, it’s been a positive experience,” says Wiebe, who runs Beaver Creek Farms with this brother, Stan, at MacGregor, Man.
Wiebe said he has not cut back on his nitrogen rate, nor has he noticed a significant yield increase. Those weren’t his reasons for making the $20,000 investment.
“I view it as one more tool in the overall pursuit of doing things properly,” he said. “We’re trying to address that whole issue of fertilizer moving in the soil. Fertilizer movement is a very real dynamic, especially in these wet years.
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“We wanted to move our nitrogen application further into the growing season. We put on about a quarter of our nitrogen during the season with the Y-drop. For us, the important thing was to get the total N on the crop without losing any.
“We did conduct some side-by- side trials last year, but we didn’t see any significant yield difference. You can’t really base anything on a one-year trial. We didn’t see any difference from our traditional all-up-front method. We’re typically around 140 to 150 bushels (with corn.”
