Variable rate Fertilizing

Small differences are still differences

This is the kind of field where variable rate supposedly doesn’t pay: homogeneous, quality limestone soil. After winter the differences between zones were small. But small is not none.

CultiWise used satellite imagery to map the biomass across the 28.67 hectares, and the prescription map corrected exactly those small differences: 130 kg/ha of liquid urea where the wheat lagged, 120 where it was ahead, against a standard rate of 125. The Amazone Pantera applied it in 0.5-metre sections.

The farmer runs variable rate here because he wants the overview: he knows what every zone got and why, instead of one average and a guess. The lagging spots caught up before stem elongation, and the field went into spring as one stand.