OVERVIEW
- Potassium (K) and boron (B) are key components of a potato nutrition program.
- Boron is crucial for promoting tuber yield, internal quality, and storability.
- Ensuring K and B availability through bulking is difficult on coarse, well-drained sandy soils and often necessitates in-season nutrient applications.
- Research has shown that K fertilizers containing micronutrients in a single granule provide improved nutrient distribution.
- Aspire® provides both early- and late-season boron nutrition for a flexible application window to better accommodate various application methods
and timings.
TRIAL DETAILS
Locations and Crop Management:
CROP: Potato (Solanum tuberosum)
YEARS: 2018-2019
LOCATIONS: 5 trials (Michigan and Wisconsin)
DATA SOURCE: Field studies conducted by independent third-party researchers.
EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN: Small-plot RCBD with 4 replications.
Cultivar: Chipping Potato (MI-Lamoka; WI-Dark Red Norland)
CROPPING CONDITIONS:
- Nitrogen and phosphorus was applied to the entire trial
- Source, Timing and Rate:
– Preplant: Immediately prior to planting
– Topdress: 2-3 weeks following planting
- MOP (Preplant): 300 lbs K₂O/ac
- MOP (Preplant): 180 lbs K₂O/ac | MOP (Topdress): 120 lbs K₂O/ac
- Aspire (Preplant): 300 lbs K₂O/ac + 2.5 lbs B/ac
- Aspire (Preplant): 180 lbs K₂O/ac + 1.5 lbs B/ac | Aspire (Topdress): 120 lbs K₂O/ac + 1.0 lbs B/ac
RESULTS
SUMMARY
- The trials were responsive to the need for season-long K and B availability.
- Aspire® increased yield over MOP by 17 cwt/ac in the “Preplant” treatment and 19 cwt/ac in the “Preplant”+”Topdress” treatment.
- Split applying MOP gave a 7 cwt/ac increase over MOP (Preplant), while split applications of Aspire® resulted in a 9 cwt/ac increase compared to Aspire® (Preplant).
- Collectively, these findings suggest that a total improvement of 26 cwt/ac is possible with better nutrient source selection and split application practices.
