A new and free online tool can help growers estimate profit loss from soybean cyst nematode. The SCN Profit Checker calculator was developed by the SCN Coalition, a collective of researchers from colleges in nearly 30 U.S. states and the Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.
It’s designed to provide a clearer picture of SCN levels in a field and guidelines on the cost of the disease, and is based on data gathered from more than 25,000 research plots.
The researchers who developed the calculator identified four factors that have a primary effect on SCN reproduction and levels of yield loss that result: egg counts; a field’s sand content percentage; a field’s soil pH; and the SCN female index, which represents the level of reproduction possible with fields planted to varieties with the PI 88788 resistance.
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That source has been bred into more than 95 per cent of all SCN-resistant varieties in Canada and the U.S. dating back to the early 2000s.
Levels of resistance in cyst nematodes have risen to alarming rates in some states, where reproduction figures range from 75 to 90 per cent. That means growers may have just 10 to 25 per cent control.
Growers are encouraged to pull soil samples before winter to check SCN levels, sand content and soil pH. To make easier it to use the calculator, researchers who developed the tool were asked to provide a default value for the female index.
The only other statistics a grower will need is a yield goal or yield results from a field, plus the expected market price when they sell the crop.
The calculator can be found at www.thescncoalition.com/profitchecker. The website also contains several instructional videos on how to use it.
