As the end of corn harvest begins and you move on to planning for spring 2021, there is one important step your Landus agronomy team encourages you to remember. Fall soil sampling.
Whether you've been using variable rate fertilizer or seeding prescriptions or are just curious about the health of your soils, now is the time to get your data ready for making spring decisions.
Hybridized Grid Soil Sampling
Hybridized grids take grid data and overlay it on top of a zone map. The creation of a Landus Cooperative zone map takes these additional variabilities into account. Hybridized grids can be used to gain more information and intensify management across your farm.
Benefits of Hybridized Grid Sampling
- Applicable with any grid size
- Ability to move grid points into management zones to increase management practices
- Set variable yield goals throughout field
- Use existing grid soil sample data to intensify management
Manure Management Compliant
Growers today are challenged to protect resources, while also maintaining crop and animal production. As a result, there is an urgent need to develop, adapt, and innovate when it comes to manure management technologies and practices.
Hybridized grids help minimize over-application of manure in areas of the field with higher nutrient values. This approach is useful for growers who utilize grid soil sample results but have not yet implemented variable yield goals behind their grids. Doing so results in a much higher level of field management.
Standard Grid Soil Sampling
Grid sampling is a simple and unbiased method for site-specific soil management. After soil samples are pulled, georeferenced, and analyzed, a map is created by assigning soil test values to a grid, revealing soil nutrient levels and variability. With georeferencing grid soil samples, Landus Cooperative ensures that your grid soil samples will be sampled from the same field locations every time.
Grid Size
Grid size typically depends on economics and desired variability. Smaller grid sizes provide a better understanding of variation throughout a field, while larger grids may be more economical.
Grid sizes offered by Landus Cooperative include 2.5 acre grids, 4.4 acre grids, and 10.0 acre grids. While standard grid sampling ensures consistent sampling procedures while revealing variability among soil nutrient values, there are still variabilities throughout a field that grid sampling does not capture. Variabilities that have a direct effect on yield. These variabilities include soil type, elevation, and crop yield potential.
