The WADO Field Day is coming up in mid-July with a welcome addition to their day lineup.
"We have two buses ordered so that means we can have about 100 people come," says Applied Research Specialist with Manitoba Agriculture, Scott Chalmers. "We've decided to not just stay in one place this year. Where we usually have a tent, we're going to have a bus tour and go to multiple sites."
One of the topics of discussion will be the greenhouse gas experiments with nitrification inhibitors.
"In modern agriculture we use synthetic nitrogen sources like urea, and anytime you apply them, specifically if you broadcast quite often that urea turns into a nitrate and then into a nitrous oxide, and it's the nitrous oxide that is very potent," explains Chalmers. "It's something like 24 times more potent than carbon dioxide and they contribute to the greenhouse effect."
Chalmers says the nitrification inhibitors keeps it in the ground where it belongs, rather than gassing off. He adds it makes the process more efficient.
"So, we've been experimenting with those, and we've been measuring the greenhouse gases coming right off the pods, which we send to the lab either in Brandon or to the University of Manitoba where they quantify the amount of gas coming off the various treatments that we have," he says. "And so we're hoping to better understand in a more applied research setting what's going on with these nitrification inhibitors."
"Are they living up to their standards, and can we cut rates of fertilizer and still get the same yield effect," adds Chalmers.
Please listen to more with Scott Chalmers below on this topic!