New Approaches You Should Be Considering
Biological crop protection comes in many forms. We’re familiar now with the concept of biopesticides, since they serve essentially the same function as traditional synthetic pesticides: they kill insect, disease, or weed pests. But biology can take different forms in protecting a crop. It may be focusing on products that help build a thriving soil microbiome, or helping the plant supplement its own inherent defense systems. Or perhaps it’s a new way to approach cultural practices before, during, or after the season that can help protect crops. No matter what direction you approach biological crop protection from, there are always new angles to consider and improvements you can make in your programs.
We asked experts from all corners of the biologicals industry to share some of these ideas that growers may not yet be considering, but that could make a difference in your success using biological tools. The insights from these thought leaders could have a significant impact on your crop this year, and in seasons to come.
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James MaudeSenior Vice PresidentAcadian Plant Health
Understand the technology you're considering and how it works. There's more planning needed when you use biological technologies if you want to see good results. Look at the value proposition of the product and think about how that fits into your regenerative farming system.
I don't think the understanding, the knowledge, is fully transferred yet down through the system. Not to the level there is with more traditional tools. Growers don't always have the support network for sustainable farming that they actually need. Get in touch with the manufacturers of the product and seek their advice.
Have a plan for what success looks like. With synthetic fertilizer, you put the fertilizer on and as long as there's some moisture around you will see an effect. With a knock-down insecticide, you'll see insects die, you'll see them on the ground. With a herbicide, you'll see the weed start to die.
You may not see those impacts from biological technologies, or it's likely to take longer. So, it’s important to understand what the measurement of success is. If you were to apply a seaweed extract to a crop in perfect conditions, it's got high nutrient availability, and it doesn't experience any stress events, then you're unlikely to see a direct benefit.
But if we make an application when the crop is young, when it's very vulnerable to stresses and in a key physiological point in its life, if there's a stress event, you will see an effect versus a crop that hasn’t had an application.
Look at the longer-term timeframe for the soil health benefits. We know seaweed extract plays a key role in delivering soil carbon and interacting with the microbiome, both critical elements of healthy soil. These effects are longer term but have an outsized importance on the sustainability of any farm. Without healthy soil your farm is evolving to be much less productive and forced to inject more and more investment into higher and higher fertilizer and pesticide usage.
If you're making the crop already resilient through its own defense mechanisms using a biostimulant, and then you apply a biofungicide, you're having a synergistic effect. One plus one equals two.
Consider combinations. Combinations of products are so important in this area. Biological crop protection products are highly effective and efficient, but they're always compared to the synthetic products. If you look at the regulatory process in Europe, if you want to register a fungicide, you have to get 98% control to have a full claim on the label. A biofungicide is not likely to give you 98% control. However, if you apply a biostimulant with a biofungicide, you're likely to get a higher level of control, much more than you will if you apply a biofungicide on its own. Because again, you're augmenting the plant's own natural processes to make it more resilient to stress.
Biotic stress is similar to abiotic stress to a crop. If a disease comes in, if you're making the crop already resilient through its own defense mechanisms using a biostimulant, and then you apply a biofungicide, you're having a synergistic effect. One plus one equals two. So, think about the combination effects. There's quite a lot of evidence to support this today. ▪
Bond McinnisTechnical Sales ManagerAgrauxine by Lesaffre
Biologicals can help with resistance management. Growers in both conventional and organic production are always in need of new, innovative fungicides. That’s one of the reasons I see the biocontrol sector really growing. What growers are really looking for is ways to control these ever-evolving plant diseases. We need to have new novel modes of action.
We still depend on some of the synthetics if you're a conventional grower. But I look at disease control and I would say, as a grower you need to develop a program. You need to use different-mode-of-action products. That may be using different synthetics, but biocontrols can also really come in handy because they provide a way to break up resistance development. It targets those fungi and bacteria in a different way. And that’s key because resistance management is one of our major issues with a lot of our key diseases, including powdery mildews, downy mildews, and rust. We're always looking for help with resistance management, and biocontrols in general are very effective for that, because it provides new modes of action.
I think the real value of biocontrol is it gives growers a way to control diseases in their program, but also provides a great opportunity for transparency. We are using safe products.
Biologicals offer a highly visible story of safety and sustainability. As growers, we have to sell our product to a consumer, to a buyer. And what are buyers looking for? Buyers are looking for quality. We can provide that with biological fungicides. But we also want visibility or transparency on what we’re using to provide that perfect apple, blueberry, or squash. And I think the real value of biocontrol is it gives growers a way to control diseases in their program, but also provides a great opportunity for transparency. We are using safe products. Buyers and consumers want quality, but as the public and their families eat the food we’re producing, we have that safety that they really want.
Understand what biological products can and cannot do well. Early application and timely application at the beginning of the first sign of infection is key. And every biofungicide needs to have good coverage of leaves, stems, fruits to really give you the performance.
Something I like about biocontrols — we have a very flexible label. We want to follow the label in terms of rates, but it may be ok to apply any time in the production cycle. There may be no max number of applications per season. Look at your label. What are the strengths? There are certain diseases or situations where one product is better than the other. That's how you develop your program. ▪
David LongSeed Treatment Technical ManagerAlbaugh
Handling and timing are important considerations even before you begin. Biologicals can be living, or they can be non-living. How you use those products could be very different for each of those cases. A non-living product could be used almost like a traditional chemistry. But when we think about living organisms, we have to think about how they can survive in the environment, or with other traditional chemicals.
Some of these products require refrigeration, and some do not. As a user, you would want to understand that. Do you have the infrastructure to work with these biologicals at your farm?
When we think about living organisms, we have to think about how they can survive in the environment, or with other traditional chemicals.
The other factor is understanding whether these living organisms have some type of survival structure in them. Some living organisms have spores that can survive harsh environments and can be compatible with traditional chemicals. If you have that type of product, maybe you can utilize it much more easily on your farm before you plant.
But there are others that, once you open it, you place it on the seed or into water to be able to spray it. Oftentimes you will have to use it that day, and that doesn't always work out. Mother Nature may say it's going to rain that day, so you have to understand the potential consequences in using those types of biological products.
Consider compatibility. There are very few occasions where a biological product is going to be used by itself. Of course, we have organic production and some types of sustainable agriculture where biologicals may be used with other biological products. But many times, they're used with traditional chemistries.
With these other chemistries, many times, fungicides, insecticides, or nematicides are built to attack fungi or bacteria. In some cases, these products (traditional chemicals) may contain a bactericide. You need to understand how those pieces fit. If you use a biological, you want it to survive.
Also understand what that biological product is bringing to a combination. Some biological products may be more acidic in nature to keep the unwanted bacteria from growing in that product. If that's the case, you also want to make sure it's compatible with the other products in the mix, because a lot of times pH changes in mixtures with colors, with polymers, and with other things can affect how they are applied. Understanding the compatibility of the biologicals with whatever else you may be using in your mix is very important.
Set the proper expectations. There are some biologicals that basically rival traditional chemical products. They're that good. There are many that are not. Depending on your production requirements, you may have different expectations for results. If you're going into a sustainable agriculture or an organic situation, a lot of times you're comparing results with a biological to doing nothing — a seed that doesn't have anything, or basically using no other products. Your expectation of success, in this case, is on a different scale.
But when you're looking at a biological versus a traditional chemical, your expectations will likely be a lot higher. Will the product perform similar to a traditional chemical? How will the product perform versus other biological products? How does it perform compared to doing nothing at all? We spend a lot of money, time, and effort doing research on biologicals and we want to help growers know what they can expect. ▪
Joy YouwakimAgroecology ScientistBiome Makers
Find out what’s in your soil before you do anything else. Test your soil first so you know what you're missing. Maybe you need to look for a biostimulant that claims to help with yield, so you're looking for a biostimulant that increases phytohormone production. Or perhaps you need a biostimulant that can help increase your nutrient cycling. Those are two very different problems. You wouldn't want to buy the wrong biostimulant and be treating for an issue that you don't have. So definitely, number one, test your soil.
It's very easy to get overwhelmed with the plethora of options. Do not fret. There is a solution. And we're living in a really exciting time with a lot of great products on the market.
Explore all of your options — and ask for trial results. Look at the different biological products on the market. There's a whole suite of them. They're all very different in nature, and if you can find products that have had field trials conducted behind them, that will give you an idea of how effective they are and help you sort through the weeds.
Don’t be afraid to try something new. It's very easy to get overwhelmed with the plethora of options. And you can surely find a product that works for you. Weed through the information and home in on exactly what you need. So do not fret. There is a solution. And we're living in a really exciting time with a lot of great products on the market.
There are biostimulants that can help us with crop protection. They can increase our biocontrol as well as increase different metabolites that secrete stress adaptation hormones so, yes, absolutely. Biological products and biostimulants are very helpful for that. ▪
Michael Brownbridge
Senior Technical Services ManagerBioWorks
Biology requires a different approach. We're in the preventative game, not the curative game, so timing is very different. We should not be using biology when things are at the point of, “Oh, my God, I'm going to lose my crop.” It shouldn't be the last tool you reach for in your toolbox. It should be the first one to prevent ever getting to that point. If you are at that point, either the crop’s a write-off, or now your only option is to use chemistry, then come back in with biology. So, strategic use of the materials together can be very, very effective. It's the use of biological tools as part of a program. They don't have to be standalone products. In fact, we oftentimes see better program efficacy by using biological and chemical tools together. If you can use biology for the whole crop, fantastic. That's the goal. It isn't always quite achievable, but it should be the goal.
Today's formulations are not what they were 10 or 15 years ago. We have made huge advances in the formulation world to produce better products in terms of end-user characteristics.
Biopesticide technology has improved by leaps and bounds. For anybody who tried using biopesticides in the past without the level of success you hoped for, today's formulations are not what they were 10 or 15 years ago. We have made huge advances in the formulation world to produce better products in terms of end-user characteristics. It's easier to prepare. It's more stable because of the way it's formulated, it's easier to apply, more reliable. And I think that's a key piece.
Become educated on the products, how to use them, how to integrate the products in a program, how to apply them correctly. It's not just pointing a spray gun at something and hoping for the best. If you put it in the right place at the right time, it's going to work more effectively than if you don't pay attention to that.
We have also seen in the last few years with biological products — yes, we can use conventional sprayers to apply them, but increasingly, they're formulated for low volume applications as well, so cold foggers. I'm never a fan of putting living biological organisms through thermal foggers, although there's a little bit of progress being made there. But certainly, the low volume, the cold fog applications, can work fantastically well. And then you have the biochemical biopesticides which typically aren't affected by the heat, certainly in something like a thermal fogger.
What does success look like to you? When working with customers who want to make the shift from purely using chemistry to starting to incorporate some biological, I think it's really important to establish what their expectations are upfront. What does success look like to them? And you'd be surprised what success might look like.
For example, thrips is a is an enormous problem this year, it seems, as are mealybugs, as are two-spotted spider mite. People are throwing the same old chemistry at these things, and nothing's happening. In that sort of situation, you’re thinking anything's got to be better than this. If you're on a chemical track, you're going to go back in and back in, and back in, and back in. You've already set the stage where you never will achieve a hundred percent control. It doesn't matter what you're putting on there. There’s a high likelihood that you will have to repeat after a certain amount of time, and then repeat and repeat and repeat. By using chemistry you've kind of eliminated other options at that stage, whereas if you're using something like a biopesticide you can use those compatibly, together with other tools like macrobial biocontrol agents — predators and parasitoids. So, you can use one to get populations down to a certain level. Then another one comes in and takes over. You still have options. If you go the chemistry track, you're eliminating some of the opportunities you have to control pests using biological tools. ▪
Alex Cochran
Chief Technology Officer
DPH Biologicals
Understand the difference between biological and synthetic crop protection tools. There's an enormous amount of confusion amongst growers regarding biological technologies — specifically what they do and how to use them. So, the first piece of advice I would provide for growers is to know what your technology is at the at the very outset. Do your homework working with the supplier and the distributor to understand what the technology is and how to best handle it. Can it be stored at room temperature, for example, or does it need to be refrigerated? Is it something that's stable for a few months, or is it stable for a few years?
You need to be mindful of how these technologies can be used, and frankly, how they can't be used. That's probably more important.
When we use traditional synthetic technologies, growers tend to disregard some of those things, because generally products are stable for multiple years. They don't need to be handled in different ways. But that may not be the case for many biologicals. Some have limitations in terms of how they can be handled. While others, like our biofertilizer TerraTrove SP-1 Classic, is a stable liquid formulation that is easy to tank-mix or apply in-furrow, drip, or foliar broadcast. So, you need to be mindful of how these technologies can be used, and frankly, how they can't be used. That's probably more important.
Pay attention to best practices and how to use the technologies. Both the supplier of the technology and the distributor should be able to describe in detail the dos and the don'ts of their technology. Not just the handling. There's also an important facet of just how best to use the technology. In many cases, especially for biofungicides, these technologies need to be used in a preventative fashion to be effective. It's a bit different with bioinsecticides, but biofungicides are only going to be effective if you're using them on a preventative basis. If farmers try to use them on a curative basis, they will be disappointed with the outcome.
So, understand best practices. Can this technology be slotted in a seasonal spray program? What can it be combined with in the field? What is the overall strategy to best use this to ensure success for the grower? That's not always intuitive. So, assuming what you've done with technologies that you're more familiar with like synthetic fungicides and trying to apply those same rules will likely lead to disappointment in what you see. So just be very, very clear on how to best use the technology.
Think about the management system as a whole. One of the things that we've been looking at is one of our own technologies called Residuce Complete. It's a crop residue degrader. We certainly do not make fungicidal claims with this technology. It is not a biofungicide. But what it does do is accelerate the degradation of crop residue, and that crop residue is a reservoir for very important diseases in crops like corn. So, for example, gray leaf spot or stalk lodging caused by Fusarium are two important pathogens that reside in crop residue, and that crop residue on the surface is the reservoir for disease in the next crop planting. If you could accelerate the degradation of that residue, you reduce the level of residue present on the surface and with it the disease inoculum present. That can have a meaningful impact on disease.
Thinking about a holistic approach, when we teach IPM, we talk about all the different ways to impact pest management. And it's not just using a pesticide. Cultural practices are important in how we manage diseases, insect pests, and weeds as well. That IPM mindset of a whole system approach is really important, so think about your opportunities outside of maybe just a pesticide that can help your situation. ▪
Meghan Rains
Field Solutions Manager, Outdoor Specialty Agriculture
Lallemand Plant Care
The biggest thing to consider is setting realistic expectations. I think the key to using a biological successfully is understanding that a biological is not a chemical and that a chemical is not a biological. You want to set yourself up for success. And to do that, you have to understand that biologicals — and in my industry, microbials — are going to be living products and are required to be used preventatively rather than curatively. They need time to establish. They may need a little bit of a softer approach when you're applying them. There are a lot of different sorts of things that have to go into the thought process behind using a biological. It's not as simple as, “I see a problem, I can correct a problem.” Sometimes, it's “I anticipate a problem. How do I get ahead of this problem? And can I use a softer chemistry to do it?”
It's not as simple as, “I see a problem, I can correct a problem.” Sometimes, it's “I anticipate a problem. How do I get ahead of this problem? And can I use a softer chemistry to do it?”
Demand actionable input and technical advice. We hold ourselves accountable as experts in the industry for being able to provide technical advice to growers. I think that's something that growers should be able to expect out of companies that manufacture technical products like this. You're not just buying a product; you're buying a solution. And you're buying the expertise and know-how for when that product's going to really provide value.
We like to make recommendations not just on when you should use a product, but also if you shouldn't use it. If disease pressure is too high, you don't want to be recommending a softer chemistry right away because you're not going to get that realized value and then it's just wasted input. A lot of times we'll come in and make a recommendation of “pair this with your harsher chemistries, but use it to lengthen out your process,” or “use this as a second application after a clean-up application.” It's really about how we can integrate these solutions into the programs that growers are already using.
Understand how all the pieces of your program will work together. At Lallemand we have a very comprehensive compatibility testing program for all of our products. And when you're dealing with biologicals and realistic expectations, if you are going to be integrating these into programs that already exist, there's a likelihood that they're going to be applied with something that's maybe a bit harsher, something that might not play nice in a tank mix, or in a sequential application.
We like to have that information available, so that when people are applying these products, they can actually be very confident in the level of efficacy that they can expect and that there's not going to be clogging or any issues when they get on the plant, or phytotoxicity, for example.
Understanding how things play in a tank is step one, and we always recommend a jar test. In doing so, you can see any physical incompatibilities. You can see if you're maybe going to get some clogging. Any formulation issues that could arise are usually very visible in a jar test. ▪
Mark Jirak
North America Marketing and Business Development Lead
Syngenta Biologicals
Change of mindset: Apply preventively and frequently. With biologicals, it’s important to understand the timing of the application and the expected performance. That will help dial in how these products ought to be used.
As a grower you need to make sure that you're using the products before there's heavy infestation, whether it be insects or diseases. It should be more of a preventative application. And you may have to apply more frequently. You may not get the length of activity that you might see with conventional chemistry. Those are two critical things from a performance standpoint. Use it preventatively and more frequently.
Make sure that you're using the products before there's heavy infestation. It should be more of a preventative application.
Work with the manufacturer to enhance your success with biologicals. One of the things that Syngenta prides itself in is to have science behind our recommendation. We've done the research and we've done the development of the product. So, we know what expectations should be set with the product. Working with your manufacturer to understand what the product can do and can't do will give you the best opportunity for success in your crop protection program.
Residue management with biologicals. If you use a biological product toward the end of the production cycle it may help you manage residues, so that can help from an export standpoint. It can also help with a marketing message to consumers that they know we're using biological products. And we’re doing so at the end of the cycle, so in essence, you reduce the incidence of potentially any residues that that might occur otherwise. ▪
