CSD Grains News

Australian owned company CSD Grains is set to revolutionise the soybean planting seed market with the release of commercially available pre-inoculated soybean seed.

CSD Grains general manager Peter Rozendaal said the technology comes on the back of a two year joint research effort between Becker Underwood and CSD Grains.

“The HiCote Biostacked® seed-applied inoculant is a new generation of inoculant that can survive as a seed treatment in the bag for up to 60 days,” he said.

“We will be offering the treatment on a range of varieties including Bunya, Cowrie, Fraser, A6785, and others,” Mr Rozendaal said.

Peter Rozendaal said CSD Grains had particularly successful seed crops in 2009, returning large quantities of high quality planting seed.

“Our quality assurance team spent a lot of time getting things right in all parts of the chain – from the field to the storage and this effort has paid off,” he said.

CSD extension and development agronomist Robert Eveleigh, who was involved in the field testing of the seed treatments, said there were many practical advantages of pre-inoculated seed and he had seen a real demand for it during the past planting season.

“For people treating their own seed in a cement mixer, it’s very labour intensive and can potentially slow the planting operation down – not good if it means you could miss the planting moisture and have to plant into less than ideal conditions,” he said.

“While applying inoculant as an in-furrow spray is less labour intensive, you often see the effects of blocked nozzles, plus re-filling tanks is another time-consuming job to do at planting,” he said

“We provided our variety trial growers with pre-inoculated seed last season and all these people commented on how easy it made the planting operation – it happened much quicker and freed up one to two extra staff,” he said.

“Testing of the HiCote Biostacked® seed has also shown some potential to increase soybean yields. A trial planted in 2007 gave a 5 percent yield advantage over conventionally inoculated seed and this is consistent with many trials done in the United States.” he said.

CSD Grains has invested in custom application equipment to ensure good coverage and minimise damage to seed.

Peter Rozendaal said that the HiCote Biostacked® seed would be priced competitively with current on-farm application methods but comes with the added advantage of long-term on-seed survival.

“The real savings are in time and labour,” he said.

To promote the early adoption of this new technology by the industry, CSD Grains are pricing HiCote Biostacked® seed the same as other commercially available seed ordered prior to November 13, 2009.

Further Information:
Peter Rozendaal 0746 985600
Rob Eveleigh 0428 915921