Contact: James Holden, 0408 669 026
March 26, 2009
Pioneer corn crops win grand and reserve champions at 2009 RASQ competition
A crop of corn grown by Peter and Robert Cuzens of Dalby was the grand champion at the Royal Agricultural Society of Queensland competition this year.
The irrigated crop of Pioneer® hybrid 3237 was grown on the Cuzen’s property ‘Bindaree’ and yielded almost 15 tonnes per hectare.
Each year the grand champion crop title is awarded to the crop with the highest number of points under the Heritage Toowoomba Royal Show rating system. The winner can come from any crop grown and harvested in the previous season.
In a good season for corn, Pioneer® hybrid 3237 took out the Queensland Country Life Grains Outlook grand champion title with a yield of 14.923 tonnes per hectare and the reserve champion went to a dryland crop of Pioneer® hybrid 31G66 grown by Phil Crothers of
Warwick, which yielded 12.016 tonnes per hectare.
Peter Cuzens said it was an excellent season with good rain falling when it was needed. The 3237 corn was watered just three times during the year.
The crop was planted on September 20, 2007 after rain and sown deeper than normal to help improve the development of the secondary root system. Mr Cuzens said the seed was treated with placed about 75 mm into the ground and took 11 days to emerge.
The seed was treated with Betta Strike® to control soil-borne insects.
“By the time it came up it had developed good secondary roots,” Mr Cuzens said.
Corn is normally ‘flushed’ with water to get the secondary roots going so he said deep planting effectively saved one irrigation.
“It was a soft season with plenty of moisture on a well-drained paddock,” he said.
Pre-plant applications of fertiliser included 310 kg/ha of urea, 90 kg/ha of starter Z and 90 kg/ha of muriate of potash. A further 30 kg/ha of starter Z was applied at planting.
Further nitrogen applications were made as fertigation during the first and second irrigations with 30 kg/ha of nitrogen applied when the crop was nine weeks old.
Robert, Zac and Mitch Cuzens in the crop of Pioneer® hybrid 3237 that was awarded grand champion at the 2009 RASQ competition.