Planter Crop Tour | Massey Ferguson

Crop Tour Highlights

For more than five years, we’ve been conducting field trials all over North America (and the world for that matter), aptly titled “Crop Tour.” These agronomic trials are geared toward optimizing planter settings and equipment features to maximize yield potential. Look at these four major highlights from five years of data collected from more than 20 Crop Tour plots around North America.

Singulation

Quantified the yield impact of poor seed singulation (percent of skips and doubles) in corn across 22 different fields* using modified seed plates installed on certain row units to intentionally create skips and doubles. Our study found:

Payback*: When the percent of skips and doubles was minimized and singulation was improved, we saw a 2.31% increase on our return per acre.

Downforce (DF)

Compared automatic downforce control using DeltaForce® against two fixed downforce pressure settings and our study found:

Payback*: When not using DeltaForce and planting with fixed downforce pressure that was too low, the average loss was 6.32% per acre. When planting with fixed downforce pressure that was too high, the average loss was 1.43% per acre.

Depth of Planting

Determined the optimum planting depth for corn across multiple* locations and growing environments and our study found:

Payback*: The impact of planting too shallow (1 vs. 1.5) was a 6.41% loss per acre, while the impact of planting too deep (3 vs. 3.5) was a 3.92% loss per acre.

Closing Wheel

Measured the yield impact of closing wheel aggressiveness across eight different locations* and found:

Payback*: When closing wheels were in setting 2 compared to setting 4, we saw an increase of 2.27% in our return per acre.

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