Update from the Field: What’s Sulfur Got to Do With It?
Posted on April 10, 2020
Just as Tina Turner posed a great question about love in her 1984 song “What’s Love Got to Do with It”, I’ve been fielding several questions lately about why sulfur should be put on fields when our grandparents didn’t do it. Sulfur’s usefulness and applications are not widely talked about in the agriculture industry, even though sulfur is a very important secondary nutrient. You may be raising a 62 bu/ac soybean crop, but if sulfur is positioned correctly during the growing season, yield may increase to 72 bu/ac. Let’s take a quick look at why sulfur is instrumental in the production of both corn and soybeans.
As a result of the Clean Air Act, power plants and automobiles have removed sulfur from fuel and exhaust. Correspondingly, atmospheric deposition of sulfur has been reduced over this period of time, Figure 1. Previously, crops received sulfur from rainwater. Given the reduced amount of sulfur in the atmosphere, sulfur must now be supplemented to meet crop nutrient needs. The corn and soybean crop will take up sulfur as sulfate (SO2-4), which has a double negative charge. Just like nitrate, sulfate is very mobile in the soil profile. Since sulfate can be leached out of the root zone quickly, the application must be timely and correctly placed.
Figure 1: Map of the United States showing the change in atmospheric deposition of sulfur from 2000 to 2018.
https://www3.epa.gov/airmarkets/progress/reports/acid_deposition_figures.html
The timely application of sulfates has been proven to increase soybean yields by Dr. Shaun Casteel, Associate Professor of Agronomy at Purdue University. His multi-year soybean study shows a 10bu/ac advantage over the untreated check when sulfates are applied prior to planting, Figure 2. An application of NutraSoft® DG will supply both calcium and sulfates to germinating soybeans. NutraSoft DG pelletized gypsum may be easily mixed with other dry fertilizers and spreads uniformly.
Figure 2: This 2018 soybean study from Purdue University shows if you apply pelletized gypsum in front of planting soybeans, you can increase your yields by 10bu/ac.
Harvested corn contains 0.5 pounds of sulfur for every 10 bushels of grain. With trend-line corn yields increasing, more sulfur is being removed from the root zone than what is being replaced naturally. An application of sulfur in-furrow while planting is the most efficient way of supplying sulfur to the plant. Along with an in-furrow starter application, applying sulfur throughout the season can be an excellent way to provide additional sulfur to meet crop needs. UltraMate® Zn and OverPass® CF provide additional sulfur to the crop during critical periods in the growing season. UltraMate Zn (3-0-3 1S, 3.7Zn) will complex nutrients and allow more efficient nutrient uptake into the plant. OverPass CF (22-0-2 1S, 0.5B) can be tank-mixed with a fungicide application during tassel.
In conclusion, sulfur is essential for crop growth and should be incorporated into your crop fertility program.
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