Agrii trials have shown that adding a plant health elicitor to sugar beet fungicide programmes can improve the plant’s own defences to significantly reduce foliar disease levels and improve green leaf area.
For the past three years, it has trialled conventional fungicide treatments with and without the biostimulant, Innocul8, explains Don Pendergrast, technical manager for non-combinable crops at Agrii.
The active ingredient is the peptide PHC101. This is combined with manganese and zinc, both of which are crucial components in many plant enzymes. As with a flu vaccine in humans, peptides trigger a hypersensitive response in plants, says Don. This is well-researched and documented in the scientific literature, he notes, first published in the early 1990s.
Innocul8 triggers an immune response by mimicking the effects of a pathogen that damages nearby cell walls. This, in turn, stimulates metabolic pathways associated with the plant defending itself against a pathogen attack, he says.
“We originally looked at Innocul8 because we wanted to see if biostimulants could aid green leaf retention into the winter for sugar beet,” says Don. “We looked at some of the popular fungicides with a range of different biostimulants. Many of the products we investigated showed an adjusted sugar yield benefit, but Innocul8 stood out. It was visually better in the field.”
Even in trials with tricky-to-control diseases like Cercospora, the plant health effects of Innocul8 meant that the fungicide it was mixed with gave better disease control. Don gives the example that, in one trial, mixing 0.5 l/ha of Innocul8 with Angle (azoxystrobin + difenoconazole) reduced Cercospora severity by 75%, delivering disease suppression comparable to any other product in the trial.
The key difference, and what led to it achieving the highest adjusted yield, is the continued green leaf retention some weeks after it has been sprayed, believes Don. “I visited the site 44 days after application, and the Innocul8 was giving continued support to the crop with its plant health benefits. What excites us about Innocul8 is the consistency in trials you rarely see with other plant health products,” he adds.
Agronomist Adam Mann plans to incorporate Innocul8 into his sugar beet disease control programmes this year. One of his farmers hosted a trial last year, and it seemed to keep the beet standing better. “I have growers who have used Innocul8, and they have seen how it keeps their beet standing in dry conditions. “If we lose leaves late in the season, then the sugar levels take a hit as the crop recovers, and weeds can become a problem,” he says.
