Helping crops recover from frost and other stress events, while promoting healthy root and plant growth, the Radiate and Awaken plant nutrition products are available from Loveland Agri Products, a subsidiary of Nutrien Ag Solutions
Many farmers’ crops will face stress events, such as frost, through the winter months – which can significantly reduce yields.
According to the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), frost damage is estimated to cause losses of between $120 million and $700 million in Australia each year.
With the Radiate and Awaken products, available through Nutrien Ag Solutions’ subsidiary brand – Loveland Agri Products – farmers can help their crops recover quickly and overcome the setback of frost.
They are just two of a range of of crop nutrition and protection products developed by the company that can be used across a variety of crops and situations.
Radiate
Registered with the Australian Pesticides and Veterinary Medicines Authority (APVMA) as a growth promotant, Radiate is a hormone product that aids root and plant growth.
Loveland plant nutrition technical services specialist Ian Leonard says Radiate has proven to grow shoots and roots well.
“Shoots and roots help the crop pick up more nutrients and moisture, so Radiate helps alleviate the stress of an event like frost because there’s more soil to explore,” he says.
“A lot of our competitors make claims they have a product containing the same chemistry as Radiate but they don’t.
“Radiate is an APVMA registered plant growth regulator, proven to improve plant health by growing additional roots and shoots.”
Awaken
Awaken also assists in crop and plant growth and is a foliar fertiliser product – targeting the leaf surface.
Containing a micronutrient package, Leonard says this product helps plants create more chlorophyll, which is what gives plants and crops their green colour.
“The darker the shade of green, the more sunlight the crop can attract and therefore will help it to photosynthesise,” he says.
“The micronutrient package in Awaken keeps the plant or crop healthy and very green, so it keeps on photosynthesising and producing the food it needs to grow.”
By using this product, Leonard says crops will be able to produce more reproductive tissue, more grain or more fruit.
Recovering from stress events
Frost is one example of a stress event that can easily damage crops – depending on what stage of growth a crop is at and how much moisture is in the air.
Farmers can apply Radiate to help healthy root growth, which will speed up crop recovery, Leonard says.
“This is because Radiate promotes a healthier root system in crops, enabling a greater volume of soil to be explored, enhancing nutrient and moisture uptake for a faster recover period.”
With Awaken, the crop or plant will be able to produce more chlorophyll, Leonard says, which will enable it to attract more energy from the sun’s light, so it functions at an optimal level.
Radiate and Awaken can be effective when they are applied individually or together – making them versatile products.
They can also be used to help crops recover from other stress events that don’t involve frost.
Not long ago, Leonard had a situation in South Australia where a grower’s wheat crops were facing residual herbicide. The herbicide was left over from a previous crop because of a lack of rainfall that would usually break the herbicide down.
“The wheat was very weak, and it was bleached,” Leonard says.
“Instead of being dark green, it was a white coloured leaf.”
Leonard says a Nutrien Ag Solutions agronomist recommended to the grower that Radiate and Awaken be used together, and in less than three weeks the crop was thriving again.
“In 17 days, the crop went from a bleached white and yellowy colour, to a vibrant green,” he says.
“It recovered very quickly and didn’t negate any yield.”
In central Queensland, Leonard also encountered a situation where Radiate and Awaken were employed together to help cotton recover from a lack of sunlight.
This grower had been facing cloudy weather for an extended period, which Leonard says can be a problem for cotton.
“Cotton needs a lot of sunlight to photosynthesise and if it gets cloudy for a while the plant will respond to the lack of photosynthesis by shedding young cotton bolls,” he says.
“By using these products, the sunlight stress was alleviated, and the grower optimised his yield because less fruit was shed, and therefore more cotton bolls were retained.”
Leonard is currently dealing with an inquiry about wheat crops that are facing red legged earth mite damage.
Through ongoing discussions on which product would be more appropriate, Leonard explained that Awaken would be the way to go, because earth mites reduce the crop’s ability to produce chlorophyll and reduce the crop’s photosynthesis ability.
“Awaken will allow the crop to produce more chlorophyll, making the leaves healthier and producing more energy internally, so it can recover from the earth mite stress faster,” he says.
Through these examples, Awaken and Radiate have shown they can be used to combat a range of stress events, and they can also be applied to a variety of crops.
The Loveland plant nutrition technical services specialist says the products can be used on most commercial crops – from wheat and barley, to canola and pulse crops in the winter, including chickpeas and lentils. In the summer, Leonard says they are often used on cotton crops.
“In the stress events I’ve seen, these products have helped crops recover fast,” he says.
“If Radiate and Awaken weren’t used in these events, the crops may endure greater potential yield loss from biotic and abiotic stresses.”
For more information on Loveland Agri Products’ Radiate and Awaken, visit www.lovelandagriproducts.com.au or www.nutrienagsolutions.com.au