Science for Success: Initiative facilitates data-driven decision-making

NORMAL, Ill. — Soybean farmers have benefited from decades of checkoff-funded research that’s pushed yields, and now a program is taking those efforts to the next level.

The Science for Success initiative amplifies access to timely, data-driven best management practices so farmers can better manage agronomic sustainability.

The program brings together about 25 Extension specialists from land-grant institutions across the nation, representing more than 80% of the U.S. soybean acres.

“Science for Success has generated a lot of research that’s data-driven and facilitates data-driven decision-making on a variety of topics,” Rachel Vann, North Carolina State University Extension soybean specialist and national Science for Success lead, said at a recent Illinois Soybean Association Field Talk at Heartland Community College.

“The land-grant institutions are working together alongside state level soybean boards like the Illinois Soybean Association and the United Soybean Board to deliver best management practices to U.S. soybean farmers.”

The program currently has three primary focuses:

• Conducts coordinated research across the United States annually that drives best management practices.

• Leverages local knowledge to have national Extension impact. For example, the group recently worked with the Risk Management Agency to get the replant coverage dates adjusted for soybeans across the United States. On average, that effort resulted in a five-day earlier replant coverage date in each state. “That was not based on research we did in a coordinated way, but it was based on us working in coordinated fashion with RMA to get that done,” Vann said.

• Amplifies the impact of data-driven research-based information.

Current Research

Ongoing projects initially funded in 2021 focused on foliar nutrient feeding and sulfur applications.

In addition, research is now being conducted on biological seed treatments, and late-season desiccation decisions.

“We did research at 46 sites in 16 states over two years looking at the value of foliar fertilizer products and their impact on yield and ultimately return-on-investment when they were applied at R3, a common timing for insecticide and fungicide applications,” Vann said.

“We looked at variety of foliar fertilizer products. There’s no way we can comprehensively evaluate everything that’s available. There’s too much turnover in the marketplace.

“So, at the Commodity Classic meeting we worked with growers that sat on our state boards and we walked across the trade show floor trying to figure out what were some of the foliar fertilizer products that are most frequently used in U.S. soybean production and we came up with a list to use in the research.”

Given the uniformity of the response across these 46 sites, there is no evidence that foliar fertilizers increase soybean yield in the absence of visual symptoms of nutrient deficiency.

Similar results were observed in a smaller geographic area in past trials from Iowa and Michigan, where micronutrient and macronutrient foliar fertilization did not consistently increase soybean grain yield.

“We weren’t doing this research in areas where we saw evident issues out in the field. This was only done at application timings of R3. That timing was driven by when common pesticide applications are made and growers are thinking about adding something additional to the tank,” Vann noted.

In the biological seed treatments research, products were used that represented some of the major categories of factors that the biologicals claim to help, including increased phosphorous uptake, increased nutrient use efficiency, increased nutrient uptake and stimulated root growth, among others.

The two-year small plot research concluded in 2022 and included over 100 sites of data. Illinois and Indiana were included in the trials.

Biological products were applied to fungicide- and insecticide-treated seed using label instructions.

In comparing the averages of the biological seed treatment products to the untreated control, the trials found “these treatments had no impact on soybean yield in the first year we did this research across 50 sites,” Vann said.

“We did research again in 52 locations the following year across 20 states. We looked at an expanded list of biological seed treatments and we saw very similar results where there was minimal impact of these biological seed treatments on yield.

“One of the things that I want to emphasize is the reason we do this research across so many sites is we’re trying to look for the circumstances where these types of products will impact yield.”

The trial data from the sites across the United States is now being broken down into clusters to see where biological seed treatments might have more of an impact. The clusters are defined by area such a weather patterns and soil types.

“So, in this data set what may likely emerge is that there might be circumstances based on your agronomics in weather and soil type factors where these products are more likely to have an impact. But when you look at the data set over the past couple of years at a high level, there weren’t any areas that emerged as spots where we were likely to see an impact unless there was an issues previously identified,” Vann said.

“At land-grant institutions, we try to evaluate a plethora of products to provide data-driven information for you to make decisions. These products generally cost $3 to $5 per acre.

“We hope to expand this data set and try to make more specific recommendations about where these products might have an impact, but on the macro level little impact on yield from our preliminary research at many sites across the U.S.”

The Science for Success team is now generating data on late-season desiccation decisions.

Desiccation is a common practice on soybeans in the mid-south and becoming more common in the southeastern United States. There has also been some interest in the data from Midwest producers.

Misconceptions

The team recently began to look at the entire soybean growth cycle and identified areas of risk management and misconceptions.

“The information provided by the Science for Success can all be found in a concise area that helps distill misconceptions of soybean production across the U.S.,” Vann said.

“This is how we can leverage local information and put it in a document that has best management practice recommendations and implications for soybean production.”

Fact sheets have been developed on a variety of topics that include righting misconceptions and are available on the Science for Success website at https://tinyurl.com/Science-for-Success.

“For example, there’s information on cover crop management prior to soybeans. We have a webinar series where a variety of different topics are highlighted. We do Extension articles about risks and misconceptions across the soybean growth stages,” Vann added.

Other research data on the website includes planting date, seeding rate and row spacing.

Bean Binoculars

A Bean Binoculars program was launched this past summer that includes an interactive tool with maps and archive of soybean production issues.

Map displays have entries of issues in real time as they arise. It also contains information about the issue, as well as detailed photos and recommended management options.

Contributions are from across the country and crop production disciplines, including agronomists, plant pathologists, entomologists and weed scientists.

“Science for Success supports soybean farmers through coordinated research. That research previously highlighted was foliar fertilizer applications, biological seed treatments and desiccation,” Vann said.

“We have other research projects going on, as well. Some are related to the sustainability score of soybeans among others. We leverage our local knowledge to have national Extension impact. That misconceptions across soybean growth stages publication is an example of that.

“We amplify research-based information. Bean Binoculars is an example of that space.”