In a context of high fertilizer prices, which generate a defensive spirit in agricultural producers, it is worth reviewing the factors that make application efficiency and the possible benefits that investment in meat production would generate. Doing things right and with a little help from the environment, each peso can be transformed into better pregnancies and more kilos of meat.
In cattle raising, INTA Chascomús specialist Matías Bailleres puts on the table two very different situations to take into account. “One thing is new pastures with legumesand another thing is old pastures with more grasses, or winter greens. One thing is to apply phosphorus aiming at maintenance, at perenniality, and another thing is aiming at the explosion that nitrogen gives”, he highlights from the outset.
When it comes to new pastures, the technician explains that Autumn is the most recommended time of the year to carry out maintenance tasks. of pastures, to make them more productive and extend their useful life. “Among these tasks is intense grazing and re-fertilization,” he remarks.
Regarding grazing, he explains that it is a way of stimulating regrowth from new tillers, keeping grasses more vigorous and with better nutritional quality, by breaking the dominance of older tissues. “On the other hand, legumes will be favored by the entry of light that will allow them to sprout and give birth to new individuals in the case of red clover and lotus,” he says.
Refering to prairie maintenance refertilizationgenerally with phosphorus fertilizers (Triple Superphosphate) or phosphorus and nitrogen fertilizers (Diammonium Phosphate and Monoammonium Phosphate), Bailleres explains that it is a practice that allows to increase forage production and the proportion of legumes (clovers, alfalfa and lotus) in the mix, allowing for more nutritional quality and greater biological nitrogen fixation.
“Before addressing a technique such as re-fertilization, we should take into account what impact it will have in order to optimize this investment in the most suitable meadow. In general, the greatest responses occur when there is less fertility in terms of phosphorus content in the soil, and the younger the pasture is,” he says, adding: “It is essential to have a minimum stand of legumes to obtain a good response when re-fertilization is phosphorous”.
On the other hand, the INTA technician provides some recommendations for the strategic nitrogen fertilization in ryegrass and pastures, with an eye on the spring. “The delay in temperate forages in recovering good production rates is due to the lack of nutrients, specifically nitrogen, due to the low temperatures in the soil for high rates of mineralization of organic matter to develop,” he explains.
For this reason, he affirms that the nitrogenous fertilization of pastures in the second part of winter could cause “an effect similar to that of advancing spring”, since it would be providing the nitrogen that the soil cannot provide.
In this line, trials carried out in the Chacra Manantiales report responses of 15 to 25 kg/ha of dry matter per kg/ha of applied urea. “In other words, fertilizing in August with 100 kg/ha of urea could provide us with 1,500 to 2,500 kg/ha of DM more, or looking at it from another perspective, it could advance the entrance to a paddock by about 30 days compared to the unfertilized situation” , details.
In the north it also applies
Cattle ranching in Argentina takes place in very diverse environments, and forage resources require specific knowledge to achieve efficient management. “In the NEA, more specifically north of Entre Ríos, Corrientes and Misiones, the natural levels of phosphorus in sleep are very low (1-3 ppm) and fertilization is an essential condition for the implantation of pastures and necessary to improve the productivity of the natural field and perennial pastures”, he explains to Rural Clarin Diego Bendersky, technician at the INTA Agricultural Experimental Station in Mercedes, Corrientes.
Particularly at this time, with the winter greens already established -ryegrass and oats for the area-, according to Bendersky, it is necessary to plantwo moments of fertilization, one at the beginning of tillering (there are still few greens that are in that physiological state) and another after the first grazing. “The fertilizer to use is urea with a minimum of 50 kg/ha per application”, he details.
At the same time, he adds that the implantation, which by now should have been carried out, must be accompanied by a phosphoric fertilization of between 80 and 120 kg/ha of diammonium phosphate and some other resource that provides equivalent levels of phosphorus.
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