Seed treatments are more powerful than ever before, but some farmers
are throwing away their benefit by applying them sloppily, says a
commercial seed treatment specialist.
“You may put the right rate on, say a 10 litre jug to 200 bushels of
seed, but if you don’t apply it right you might get 30 percent of the
seed uncovered,” said Ted Labun of Syngenta Crop Protection.
“People often say my seed treatment didn’t work, but it’s not related
to the product at all, but to the application.”
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Labun said many seed treatments now work systemically, meaning they
don’t just work on the seed surface but spread through the plant, from
roots to leaves. That provides better disease control.
“Seed treatments are offering more because their spectrums are becoming
wider and wider as new chemistry is being registered,” said Labun, a
member of the Crop Diseases Council, which advises farmers on cereal
crop diseases.
Allowing some seed to be untreated allows diseases to exist inside the
crop, which not only hurts the growing crop but also builds up disease
inoculum in the soil that can hurt future crops.
Seed diseases such as loose smut will show up quickly in a field with
unevenly treated seed. Other diseases, such as common root rot, will
show up through the season, revealing themselves in problems such as
poor tillering and low head seed counts.
Labun said farmers can easily check if diseased cereal plants in their
fields were treated. Even in July, it is possible to determine whether
the seed was treated by digging up the plant’s roots and looking for
the coloured treatment on the remnants of the seed.
“If the integrity of the seed’s still there, you’ll see the
colouration.”
Farmers who buy treated seed have little to worry about, he added. Most
seed growers and seed cleaners who treat seed have good application
equipment and know what they are doing.
“There have been tremendous advances in recent years.”
But farmers who do it themselves should make sure they are taking it
seriously.
“It’s very simple things,” Labun said, “like slowing down from 30 bu. a
minute to 20.”
