The New Regen Ag Support Program: Unlock More Bushels for Less™

A position paper from Meristem Crop Performance

Doing more with less? That’s a foundational principle for American farmers. Innovation, hard work and stewardship of family, farm, soil and water — it’s these virtues that have doubled per acre grain production over the past 40 years. Now thousands of top farmers and their agronomists are taking it up another notch with biologicals to reduce cost and boost return on investment (ROI).

How? They are unlocking a “production accelerator” for real productivity: producing more bushels for less cost per bushel. And now, they are in position to enhance their ROI further through regenerative agriculture and carbon programs by using Meristem technology to:

“We’re always about more bushels for less,” explains Mitch Eviston, Meristem Founder and CEO, “and now our platform is perfect for farmers making their ROI even better with regenerative ag practices that can be monetized through EQIP, Section 45Z and carbon emission offsets (see sidebar).”

To be clear, at Meristem Crop Performance, we are NOT in the business of making money through the buying and selling of carbon or documenting outcomes in regenerative agriculture. Instead, it’s our mission to provide a comprehensive, easy-to-use system to improve efficiency, reduce production cost and provide better ROI when compared to current practices. We help our dealers, and the farmers they serve, leverage vigorous biologicals to make the most of every seed they plant, every acre they farm, and every dollar they spend.

Foundational to this system is our patented biological delivery platform — BIO-CAPSULE® TECHNOLOGY — and a product portfolio that is the best choice for farmers seeking to monetize farming practices to gain additional ROI through regenerative agriculture programs. We believe that economically and conveniently delivering bio-fertility and bio-control products with synthetic active ingredients will be a primary driver in enabling farmers to unlock more bushels for less AND deploy practices resulting in direct incentive payments. It’s all part of driving greater efficiency and real productivity.

Biology Is Fertility™ VS. “Just Put More On”

If you are aiming at crop production efficiency, start with your fertilizer spend. At field level, as much as 60 to 70 percent of applied “synthetic fertilizers” go unabsorbed by the crop in the first year after application due to “low use efficiency, which can cause environmental pollution,” according to researchers studying fertilizer’s problems.¹ Meanwhile, progress in soil science is making one thing quite clear: Soil microbes make nutrients already in the soil available to the plant.

Replicated university research has documented how plants are cultivating — call it farming — these microbes in the soil.² They are essentially attracting microbes to their roots, internalizing them, extracting nutrients, and then ejecting those microbes back out into the soil to acquire more nutrients. Here’s what these naturally occurring biologicals do for crop production:

Enhance Nutrient Use Efficiency. The right biologicals can unlock nutrients tied up in crop residue and build healthier soils through increased biological activity. In essence, they can help you reduce fertilizer cost and claw back more of the NPK you already own.

Build Strong, Healthy Plants Faster. Biofertilizers and bio-stimulants are redefining the term “starter.” When added to the furrow, they boost plant nutrition by fixing nitrogen, solubilizing nutrients and building robust root systems.

Optimize Genetic Potential All Season Long. In-season use of biologicals – enzymes, amino acids, and other plant extracts – along with fungicides and micronutrients, will help manage stress in the crop and result in more pods in soybeans and better ear-fill in corn, in other words, higher yields.

Unlocking this biological “production accelerator” requires a different approach, but it can yield great benefits that build year-on-year. And it comes at a time when two issues converge: 1) synthetic fertilizer and chemistry faces increased scrutiny for inefficiency and downside environmental risks and 2) consumers, companies and governments are seeking ways to be “carbon neutral” and are investing in “regenerative agriculture.”

Want to Cut Costs? Manage Residue

Meristem’s EXCAVATOR™ AMS, powered by patented MICROBILIZE™ Technology, breaks down residue, releases nutrients, improves planting and reduces the need for tillage. Independent research shows that EXCAVATOR AMS will release substantial pounds of NPK 45 to 60 days after spring application, good timing for the next crop. Capturing more value from your nitrogen means using an inhibitor to offset volatility and leaching, but what you add can’t be caustic to soil biology. Meristem’s bio-friendly MAINTAIN™ ELITE captures and maintains more nitrogen in the upper root zone, increasing nitrogen uptake and utilization at planting time. Then, N-GEAR™ DUAL-ACTION can help preserve it when there’s adverse weather.

All crops need nutrients, but some sources are more bio-friendly than others. The chemistry of anhydrous ammonia, a common source of nitrogen, is toxic to microorganisms in the application zone. Starter fertilizers such as 10-34-0 increase the potential for root damage and poor crop establishment due to high salt content. A new alternative, with 90-percent less salt, is Meristem’s UPSHIFT™ C, with enzymes designed to boost nutrient uptake. In summary, the enzymes in UPSHIFT C quickly unlock nutrients for crop uptake at planting time after EXCAVATOR AMS releases as much as a 10-30-30 NPK analysis for those plants.

Better plant nutrition is why Iowa farmer Kelly Garrett says he has made EXCAVATOR a standard practice in his crop production systems. “After 230 bushel-per-acre corn, there’s over 200 pounds of potassium in the residue and that potassium is so much better than potash you would apply,” Garrett, an XtremeAg farmer says. “And the phosphorus you get from that residue is so much better than what you get out of 11-52-0. That’s the kind of nutrition that we want for our crops.”

Unlock Yield: Vigorous Microbes Make the Difference

Expert agronomists know the best chance to increase yield is at the planter. Seizing that moment to give the seed what it needs, provide for the plant it becomes, and fortify it against pest and weather dynamics is critical to optimizing its full genetic potential. Key to unlocking this power is Meristem’s patented BIO-CAPSULE® seed fluency microbial delivery system. Careful, independent, in-field research has shown 10-times the number of live microbes delivered to the seed through the planter box with the BIO-CAPSULE when compared to seed treatment or liquid starter.

When vigorous beneficial microbes and enzyme-driven plant nutrition is delivered with REVLINE® HOPPER THROTTLE™ (RHT) through the planter box it increases plant mass and brings canopy faster, thereby reducing plant stress. By keeping the microbes separate from the ION-LOCK™ zinc, manganese, iron and other ingredients, they are healthy throughout the distribution system and ready for their work when the seed hits the ground. This is how BIO-CAPSULE Technology – the patented process of maintaining the vigor and vitality of microbes all the way to their point of use – will unleash the full force of biologicals in crop production. Synthetic active ingredients can now safely be combined effectively with bio-controls to fight tough pests, bringing new “modes of action” to aid control, especially of yield-robbing insects building up resistance to traits, such as corn rootworm (CRW). Delivering this synergy through the BIO-CAPSULE is another key to unlocking biology to gain more bushels for less.

Meristem’s GUARD X, announced earlier this year, is a biological pesticide that uses a unique strain of naturally occurring beneficial bacteria known as pink pigmented facultative methylotrophs (PPFMs) which protect the root zone and mitigate CRW feeding damage. The GUARD X launch came on the heels of EPA’s approval of the company’s METALAXYL ST for delivery on soybeans through the BIO-CAPSULE system, where it’s combined with a biocontrol, PREPHYTE ST™, for fighting soil-borne threats such as Pythium, Pytophthora and Fusarium.

“We know our grain farmers are facing headwinds in the coming year and we’re doing everything we can to help them take out cost and still swing for the fences,” says Eviston. “Every bushel is an opportunity.”

If you are interested in unlocking more bushels for less to cut cost, improve yield and boost your ROI, please connect with us. Watch our farmer testimonials and find your local dealer at MeristemAg.com.

¹ Biofertilizers: An ecofriendly technology for nutrient recycling and environmental sustainability

Satish Kumar, Diksha, Satyavir S. Sindhu,^⁎ and Rakesh Kumar, Dec., 2021

² James White, Ph.D., September 2018 by Rutgers University Office of Public Outreach and Communication