After a washout autumn and winter, adopting a repair and build approach will be vital to help plants recover and protect remaining yield potential – with biostimulants likely to be a beneficial addition to the programme, according to the latest advice from Interagro.

Despite a small break in the weather, the relentless rainfall that has been the theme of this season has continued through March – with no signs of letting up in the short-term.

With this in mind, when the weather finally does come right, workloads are likely to be heavy, with growers focused on rescuing what is left of this year’s cropping.

Though the outlook may be bleak at present, Interagro technical manager, Stuart Sutherland, says that putting a focus on rooting, nutrition and stress recovery over the coming weeks will help put crops in the strongest position. “Achieving good yields comes down to good foundations; strong roots, good nutrition and healthy plants. While it’s not likely to be a record-breaking year in terms of yield, repairing and rebuilding crops by focusing on these foundations will definitely help get crops over the line at harvest.”

To help with this, Stuart recommends applying a biostimulant to crops as soon as growers are able to travel. “As the name suggests, biostimulants are designed to stimulate plant growth – which is exactly what will be needed this spring,” he explains. “Different products have different functions, and it’s important to match function to objective, but for growers looking to rescue their crops over the coming weeks, Interagro’s amino acid based biostimulant, Bridgeway, is a good option.”

Derived from vegetal amino acids, Bridgeway promotes healthier crops by stimulating rooting and subsequent crop growth, optimising resource use efficiency and crucially, it increases recovery and immunity against stressful growing conditions, something that is becoming increasingly vital to growers, explains Stuart.

Strong roots

Looking in more detail at the need for good, strong roots over the coming months, Stuart notes that research at Nottingham University has shown Bridgeway to be one of the strongest stimulants of its type, increasing root mass by an average of 52% over nine separate studies.

“What’s more, the trials revealed that Bridgeway helps plants develop significantly bigger root systems when the resources they need are in short supply,” explains Stuart.

“Crucially for growers, it means applying Bridgeway to plants early in the growing season will help create more resourceful deep-rooted plants which are better able to scavenge when moisture and nutrients are in short supply to feed the growing plant,” he says. “With increasingly hot and dry conditions now becoming the norm, it can be a real game-changer for growers.

“On farm this has translated into higher macro and micronutrient uptake and improved resilience. It’s also a way to help reduce reliance on synthetic fertiliser inputs.”

The work looked at the effect of Bridgeway on plants when nutrients were withdrawn, water was reduced, and plants were subjected to heat stress. Plants treated with Bridgeway grew significantly bigger root systems (up to +49%) than untreated plants subjected to the same stresses, which also led to significantly bigger plants – up to 27% more shoot mass.

Accessing nutrition

When growers are able to travel and get fertiliser and nutrition on, Bridgeway can also help optimise uptake, continues Stuart. “Typically, plants are able to access just 60% of the applied nutrition, so as well as improving access to it, you want to be making what nutrition is taken up, used more efficiently inside the plant.”

Further studies conducted at Nottingham University in 2022 showed that reducing nitrogen beyond 60% can severely limit root and shoot growth in the early stages, but Bridgeway can help plants compensate.

“Wheat plants at growth stage 12-14 were fertilised with varying levels of nitrogen, 100% N being equivalent to 80kg/ha,” explains Stuart. “At 60% and even at 30% N, Bridgeway treated plants had 45% more roots and over 30% more shoots, compared with control plants at 100% N. They also had up to 18% more nitrogen in their leaves and chlorophyll levels were increased significantly at all N rates.”

Stress-busting solution

Finally, while many winter crops have already experienced a great deal of stress this season, recovering crops that have had to rely on their own depleted resources over winter is key to get crops fit for the energy and amino acid demands of the spring growing season, says Stuart.

“While it feels a long way off at the moment, it’s likely to not be long before we’re talking about warmer weather and droughts again – as we’ve seen in previous years. This will accelerate crop growth, so the key now is to get plant health back on track so crops are fighting fit when weeds will be competing for moisture, nutrition and sunlight, and opportunistic diseases such as yellow rust and septoria will be lurking for vulnerable crops.”

This is where Bridgeway comes into its own. Containing all the amino acids plants need – at food grade quality – Bridgeway provides a stress-busting remedy that plants can use instantly to repair. One of those amino acids is proline for example, which Bridgeway contains in high concentration, explains Stuart.

“Without amino acids, plants would need to rely on nitrogen fertiliser to build the amino acids they need. One, this takes time; two, it takes a lot of energy to do it; three, it depletes nitrogen that the crop could put to be better use; and finally, your nitrogen inputs are way more expensive than biostimulant.”

Target timings

In terms of timing and planning for the season ahead, Stuart advises applying Bridgeway as soon as possible. “If we’re thinking about prevention in wheat, T0 is a key time to start supporting your plant’s own defence system. It really is best to go early to prime plants, which we’ve seen confirmed in trials and its coming through more and more.”

In a wheat trial in New Zealand in 2023, applying Bridgeway at T0 reduced septoria incidence by 10%, compared with a T1 plus T2 fungicide programme, and reduced yellow rust levels by 12.5%, resulting in a healthier crop.

In further work last year by Prime Crop Research, Bridgeway at T0 reduced septoria incidence significantly on some leaf layers in the trials which were conducted on varieties Firefly, Wolverine and Gallant, and showed significant reduction in septoria incidence on leaves two and three in Kerrin 2022 trials.

“While biostimulants are by no means a silver bullet, products like Bridgeway are a proven, scientifically backed, small investment which could result in potentially huge returns – something that no one can afford to miss out on this season in particular.”