This is the Sugar Beet Report, bringing you the latest information from NDSU throughout the sugar beet growing season. How much fertilizer does your sugar beet crop need? What type? What works best? Here to help answer these questions is Dave Franzen, NDSU Extension Soil Science Specialist. Dave, how widespread does your soil advice go?

I'm gonna address some of the fertilizer issues for the MNDAK area and also the American crystal area. If you're in the Minnesota River Valley and Southern Minnesota district then you should be paying attention to Dan Kaier's recommendations in his group because they are different and they're not different because there's a state boundary there. They're different because the soils are different.

What nutrient recommendations would you like to share?

In North Dakota, almost all consultants these days only sample to 2 feet, and that's okay because in the last 30 years since I've been here, the sugar beet growers have been exceptionally good at paying attention to their previous crops, given credit for sugar beet leaves, small sampling in a zone manner mostly. The nitrate values in the 2 to 4 foot depth are hardly ever above 30 pounds of nitrate n per acre. And so the recommendations we have for 2 feet are that 100 pounds of nitrogen less year's soil test n to 2 feet.

Are these recommendations solely related to yield size?

It's not yield derived at all. They work. We can grow 40 plus ton beets with those recommendations. And the reason is because when you have environmental conditions that'll support those really, really high yields, There's also good conditions for nitrogen to be released from the soil to be manufactured by soil bacteria that are natural in our soils and you don't have to buy. The efficiency of nitrogen uptake by the crop is way better than it is in the dry year where the lower tonnage would be expected. So pay attention. Don't worry about yield goal. It's not important. These recommendations work.

Dave, how effective is phosphate on sugar beet?

For phosphate, sugar beet is a non mycorrhizal crop. Non mycorrhizal crops respond particularly greatly to seed placed or near seed placed banded concentrated fertilizer. And so the recommendation that Albert Sims and his group up Crookston developed here about a decade ago of 3 gallon of 10 34 o or something like it, with the seed replacing 200lbs of MAP per acre broadcast is totally a good way to go, especially in a year like this when commodity prices are low and you're having to pinch some pennies. So pay attention to that and if you're able to put that down with the seed then go for it. So 3 gallon, there's no reason to go higher than that at all. Keep soil testing and pay attention to what your soil test values are for your rotational crops of corn or wheat or whatever.

How reliable are some of the products designed for sugar beet?

There are a lot of products out there. I mean, there must be a 100 different products out there and they all claim to to do all these wonderful things. And I think it's important for growers to stay curious about these things, but I would really caution heavily against just using it based on what the marketing says in the magazines or face to face at some grower meeting. What you need to do is if you're curious is go out and put in some replicated strips with and without. You have yield monitors with GPS. You have controllers with GPS. And so you can all do this. And then later on this summer we'll give a website, give some direction on how to handle the data. There's places out there that a person could go. They're very, very easy to input data and to figure out if these are really good or not. But don't try them on one field and not another, that's not an experiment. Don't try it on half a field and not the other because that's not an experiment either. Replicated strips, that's the way to go. Don't use it until you test it.

Thanks Dave. Our guest has been Dave Franzen, NDSU Extension Soil Science Specialist. This has been the Sugar Beet Report, bringing you the latest information from NDSU throughout the sugar beet growing season.