No ruts, no worries, right? Not so, at least not when it comes to deep compaction impacts. Air pockets and macropores in soil structure help move water down the soil profile, and where water goes, so do the nutrients. Compacted soils restrict root growth, oxygen, and nutrient and water movement, ultimately restricting yield potential. What’s… Read More
Tag: Marla Riekman
Sulphur is a critical nutrient for maximizing yield potential in canola, and since peak sulphur uptake for canola happens later in the growing season than peak nitrogen uptake, applying sulphate as late as early flowering can rescue yield that’s at risk to being lost to a sulphur deficiency. Heavy rains can result in canola not… Read More
Happy Halloween! Thanks for tuning in to this RealAg Radio edition of Tuesdays with Lyndsey! On today’s show, we will hear from: Deb Stark, independent board member at the University of Guelph, on good governance; Jeanette Gaultier, with BASF, on a Canola School regarding verticillium of canola; and, Hear segments from The Agronomists with Marla… Read More
Every fall, farmers race against Mother Nature to bring in the harvest; nearly as often equipment sizes increase, putting significant pressure on soil and causing compaction. To navigate the risk of compaction at harvest — and at planting! — this episode of The Agronomists features Nick Dubuc, farmer and ag engineer, and Marla Riekman of… Read More
Agronomic strategies that maximize fertilizer efficiency should be good for a farm’s financial bottom line and the environment, but specific decisions about how fertilizer is applied should be made with the overall outcome in mind, stresses Marla Riekman, soil management specialist with Manitoba Agriculture. The 4Rs — the right source at the right rate, right… Read More
A new online tool has been launched to help farmers and agronomists in Western Canada understand nutrient removal rates to make more informed fertilizer decisions. The Prairie Nutrient Removal Calculator provides updated estimates of nutrient removal for 12 different crops, based on samples collected from farmers’ fields in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba in 2020 through… Read More
Soil acidity is an issue that’s gaining attention in the Northern Plains, especially in areas where no-till practices have been paired with high surface-applied nitrogen rates. “They’re seeing this advancing a lot faster in parts of North Dakota and Montana, under traditional zero till conditions where they broadcast urea fertilizer. They find they’re acidifying the… Read More
Interest in building soil resiliency or measuring soil health is growing. But before jumping to complicated soil health tests, we first need to understand how the basic physical, chemical, and biological properties of a soil in combination with management practices will affect soil microbial populations. “You can’t take the genetic base, essentially, like the DNA… Read More
There are plenty of buzzwords in farming and agriculture. More than just a word, however, is soil resiliency: what does it mean to have “resilient” soil? For this episode of The Agronomists, host Lyndsey Smith is joined by Anne Verhallen and Marla Riekman to discuss what makes a healthy soil, what makes up soil quality… Read More
One concern this spring is whether or not there’s enough moisture to get a crop going, but another common springtime concern is that of compaction. Compaction is a risk every time you drive on a field, but the severity of compaction depends on where soil moisture is in the soil profile. “You can’t compact a… Read More