Each year hard red spring wheat producers are faced with difficult decisions regarding choices for crop production inputs. Some practices such as fertilizer and herbicide use have clearly been shown to be economical. The economic value of practices such as seed treatment, insecticide and fungicide applications are not well understood with changing environmental influences for this region. An individual practice may be economically beneficial in one year but not in others. Therefore, a study was initiated in 2003 to evaluate the agronomic and economic impact of various discretionary inputs available to producers.

Experiments were conducted at three locations in Northwestern Minnesota; the Don Bradow Farm near Fergus Falls, U of M Northwest Research and Outreach Center near Crookston and Chris and Ken Hove Farm near Fosston. The research areas were fertilized based on a 60-bushel yield goal and recommended herbicides were used for weed control. Seven treatments were randomly assigned to plots and replicated four times at each location. Table 1 describes the seven input management systems or treatments tested. The various inputs of each management system are designated by a “YES” or “NO” in the table. With respect to seeding rate, a “YES” indicates a seeding rate based on seed count and a “NO” indicates that seeding rate was based on bushels per acre. The herbicide + fungicide treatment “YES,” indicates a fungicide added with the herbicide and “NO” indicates no fungicide added.

Table 1. Input management strategies

Treatment	Seeding Rate	Herb + Fung	Fung + Insect	Fung + Fert	seed trt
	choice	3 lf stage	flag lf	heading
1	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
2	No	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
3	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	No
4	Yes	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
5	Yes	Yes	No	Yes	Yes
6	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	Yes
7	No	No	No	No	No

The best-suited wheat variety was chosen for each environment based on previous University variety testing data. The variety Oxen was seeded at the Fergus Falls location, Alsen at the Fosston location and Ingot at the Crookston site. Seeding rates were either 1.25 million live seeds per acre (YES) or 1-1/3 bushel per acre (NO). Vitavax Extra was applied as a seed treatment at 5 oz. Per 100 pounds of seed on treatments 1,2,4,5 and 6. The three-leaf stage fungicide treatment was an application of Tilt applied at 2 oz./acre. The fungicide + insecticide treatments (1,2,3,4, and 5) were Tilt at 2 oz./a + Penncap-M applied at 1 qt/acre. The heading treatment was Folicur at 4 oz/acre + 20-0-0-3 liquid fertilizer at 10 gallons per acre. Individual input costs are listed in Table 2 and total input costs per treatment are shown in Table 3. Table 3 includes a $ 4.00/ac application charge for each treatment except the 3 leaf state treatment, which was in combination with the standard herbicide application. Table 4 lists the net economic gain or loss based on yield and treatment input costs for each treatment compared to treatment 7, which had none of the tested inputs applied. Hard red spring wheat price of $3.40 per bushel was used in the calculations for net gain or loss.

Table 2. Itemized cost for each experimental input based on spring retail prices.

Table 3. Total cost per treatment.

Table 4. Net gain or loss based on yield and management strategy input costs.

Figure 1 shows the yield response from each location relative to the seven management strategies. There were no significant statistical differences in yield when comparing management strategy 1(all tested inputs applied) or 7 to management strategy 2 through 6. Management strategy 7 consistently appeared to have more leaf disease damage at all three locations but disease injury did not translate into reduced yield or thousand kernel weights at any of the sites.

Figure 1 Wheat yield response at Crookston, Fosston and Fergus Falls, 2003.

In 2003, at all three locations, additional inputs for hard red spring wheat production were not economical taking into account the cost of the input and relative yield increase or decrease compared to management strategy 7 which had no additional inputs applied. The 2003 environmental conditions were not conducive to insect and disease damage however under favorable environmental conditions these results may be quite different.

This is the first year of a two-year trial investigating inputs for wheat production, which inputs are economic and which inputs are not. The trial will again be conducted in 2004 at all three locations.

Appreciation is expressed to the Minnesota Wheat Grower’s for providing financial support for this research. A special “thank you” is also expressed to the cooperating wheat producers who provided their land and the NW Research and Outreach Center who provided their land and plot equipment to conduct this research.