WHY TREAT SEED?

The cost of seed protectants, seed applied plant protectants, seed priming and pelleting is one of the lowest cost highest benefit inputs a grower makes.

Allowing crops to emerge uniformly and develop into healthy robust plants.

Higher yield

Using treated seeds can produce measurable yield advantages. Depending on the crop conditions and type of treatment, our products can help optimize yields by allowing the seeds to be more accurately placed, reducing seed dormancy potential, and helping seeds germinate more easily in hostile conditions. This all adds up to optimized yields.

Pays for itself

The cost of seed treatment pays for itself several times over. Grower goals include creating a perfect plant stand. The better the stand the more harvestable units per acre.

Seed treatment tools help maximize plant health. Resultant cost benefits include maximizing desired plant placement, disease and insect pest protection, reduced thinning costs and more uniform harvests.

Improved crop quality

Treated seeds grow into high-quality plants for several reasons. Pelleted seeds can be planted at more consistent depths which helps plants emerge more evenly. Priming helps induce uniformity at emergence and aids in plant maturation, which means a more consistent harvest. Seed applied plant protectants help control pest seed and seedling damage which directly affects yield and quality helping to maximize harvest potential.

A safeguard against disease

Seeds can encounter disease stress in several ways. Soil-borne fungal disease organisms can cause seed rots, damping-off, seedling blights and root rot. Other pathogens, like smut, can infect the surface of seeds. Finally, other pathogens including bacterial diseases can come from the inside of the seed itself. If it is worth growing it is worth protecting.

Pest protection with lower environmental impact

Chemical loading of pellets provides a means to treat seeds directly, instead of being delivered in-furrow, sprayed onto plants, broadcast or applied in the soil, the total amount of “toxicants” applied per acre is considerably less. Only the seed contacts the active ingredients. And that means fewer chemicals in the air, on the ground, on the plants, and into the environment.

Seed treatments are a smart way to apply pest products for a number of reasons. Benefits of seed treatments include:

• Applying the product directly on the target, chemical to the seed not the soil, not into the air, or irrigation water.
• Using a minimum amount of toxicant
• Minimizing the exposure of wildlife and beneficial organisms
• Reducing water runoff from fields into the environment.
• Significantly reduce on and off farm transportation of bulk chemicals and potential hazards associated with delivery vehicles on public and private roads, on farm tractor spillages and accidents.

Smooth machinery operation

We have developed different pellet weights and densities to fine-tune plantability and ease of handling. Conscientious growers adjust the weight of their pellets to match their soil conditions and tractor speeds. Faster tractors require heavier pellets for straighter more accurate drops. More accurate drops produce less bouncing in the seed furrow, and that maintains field singulation and uniform plant spacing.

Easier handling

Small seed and irregularly shaped seed can be hard to singulate during the planting process. Seed treatments make life a little easier for busy growers in the following ways:

• Better “flowability” in planters
• Improved slippage between individual seeds
• Different colored pellet availability makes it easy to identify different varieties within the same species
• Pellets are more identifiable in the ground when tuning a planter for seed depth and spacing.