The number of soil tests conducted in Manitoba has nearly tripled in less than a decade.
Data collected by the International Plant Nutrition Institute (IPNI) found that the number of soil samples sent to testing labs increased to 42,000 last year from 15,000 in 2001.
John Heard, a soil fertility specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, said this is partly due to the popularity of precision agriculture and strict regulations for manure application in the province.
“I’d attribute it to increasing N costs, the increase associated with variable rate fertilization, more crop consultants with quality soil sampling equipment, and of course, more sophisticated farmers.”
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However, many of those same factors were also at play in Saskatchewan and Alberta, where soil testing numbers have remained stagnant.
The IPNI said in its 2010 summary of soil sample data that testing increased substantially in North America over the last decade, but farmers in Saskatchewan and Alberta have bucked that trend.
Testing dropped to 24,430 in 2010 from 24,627 in 2001 in Saskatchewan and to 26,877 from 37,437 in Alberta.
However, the Alberta figures for 2010 didn’t include a major testing lab that didn’t have time to participate in the IPNI survey.
Nonetheless, the amount of agricultural soil testing has remained flat in Saskatchewan and Alberta, said Tom Jensen, IPNI director for the northern Great Plains in Saskatoon.
“Soil sampling in Saskatchewan hasn’t changed much,” he said.
“If we look in Western Canada, there’s probably only 20 percent of the fields that are soil sampled and many of those are maybe sampled every three years.”
Instead of sampling, growers apply nitrogen based on targeted yields. They will likely add more nitrogen if conditions look promising, he added.
“(Or) they are using past history on what people are (applying) in their area. A lot of that is based on experience,” Jensen said.
Growers may also choose not to test because they don’t have sufficient time in the spring.
“It does take time,” he said.
However, farmers in other parts of North America, primarily the U.S. corn belt, are making time for soil testing because they practise precision agriculture.
“In Manitoba, farmers have tended to adopt the zone management technology sooner than the farmers in Saskatchewan and Alberta,” Jensen said.
Choosing not to soil test isn’t an error or an oversight, he added, but farmers miss an opportunity to save or make money.
“Some areas are probably putting on more fertilizer than they need to. Conversely, they’re not putting on enough in some areas,” he said.
“We’re quite concerned in lots of cases, especially with the higher yielding canola hybrids, that we’re removing more from the soil than we’re replacing.”
