Canola Response to Enhanced Efficiency Nitrogen Fertilizer Products and Blends – Year 2

Term: 1 year
Status: Ongoing
Researcher(s): Chris Holzapfel, IHARF; Ishita Patel, Brianne McInnes, NARF; Robin Lokken, Zoe Galbraith, CLC; Jessica Enns, WARC; Bryan Nybo, Amber Wall, WCA; Mike Hall, ECRF
SaskOilseeds Investment: $76,000
Total Project Cost: $76,000
Funding Partners: N/A

 Objective

 To demonstrate the effects of several side-banded enhanced efficiency nitrogen (N) fertilizer products and blends, relative to untreated urea, on canola establishment, yield, and quality.

Project Description

Nitrogen fertilizer management has long been amongst the most important considerations in Saskatchewan grain production, and canola is one of the largest users of this nutrient. Optimizing N fertilizer use efficiency is more important than ever with high fertilizer prices and increasing awareness of and societal pressure to minimize greenhouse gas emissions associated with N fertilization.

Adoption of EEF products will continue to increase and farmers will benefit from understanding the mechanisms of N loss they are most susceptible to and how EEF products differ in their ability to reduce said losses. To varying degrees, the products we propose to demonstrate have been evaluated in numerous applied-research demonstrations conducted by IHARF and other Agri-ARM members over the years, often in combination with contrasting application timings or placement methods. Nitrogen placement has generally been more important than N form with respect to yield/protein and EEF products have shown the greatest potential to be beneficial when combined with sub-optimal timing or placement. This project will build upon past and ongoing projects focused on 4R nitrogen management, but with a greater focus on these fundamentally different N formulations as opposed to timing/placement options. The project complements recently concluded research with wheat led by Dr. Brian Beres (AAFC-Lethbridge) with sites throughout western Canada and will provide an opportunity for discussion of how common EEF products differ, and the types of N losses we are most vulnerable to when banding N during the seeding operation. Consistent with previous years, essentially all the major commodity groups, along with several Ministry agronomists, have identified evaluations of different N forms and blends as research priorities.

With funding from SaskCanola, this project was conducted at seven Agri-ARM locations in 2024. For many areas, the growing season turned out to be quite dry, likely reducing the potential for certain environmental N losses (i.e., particularly denitrification and leaching) while also reducing yield potential or becoming a more important yield limiting factor than N use-efficiency. We hope that collecting more data in 2025 will allow us to document responses under unique environmental conditions, resulting in a more robust dataset and improved understanding of which EEF N products and blends are likely to be beneficial under a wider range of circumstances. With funding from ADOPT, we see this an excellent opportunity to build upon SaskOilseeds investment in 2024 which will also compliment a current SFP project investigating wheat responses to a smaller selection of side-banded EEF N products. 

Link to results from 2024 project: Canola Response to Enhanced Efficiency Nitrogen Fertilizer Products and Blends — SaskCanola