ONTARIO GRAIN FARMER AGRONOMY 32 experts, underscoring the YEN’s commitment to sharing practical, field-tested knowledge that empowers farmers and agronomists across the Great Lakes region. WRAPPING UP THE 2025 GREAT LAKES YEN This year’s wrap-up meetings featured two notable speakers from Michigan State University. Conservation Systems Agronomy educator Rich Price shared how variable rate nitrogen mapping is giving farmers a better understanding of how they can optimize fertility across their fields. Kurt Steinke, an expert in soil fertility and nutrient management, provided an engaging overview of what the data revealed about using nitrogen stabilizers in wheat. Another highlight of the wrap-up meetings is always the farmer and agronomist panels. At each session, selected farmers and agronomists offered brief overviews of their practices and management strategies. Participants were encouraged to ask questions, hearing directly from other YEN members about how they've applied YEN learnings to their own management decisions. Over the past five years, the YEN program has gathered complete datasets from more than 600 fields - an invaluable resource for researchers and extension specialists alike. Currently, the Great Lakes YEN leadership team is partnering with the University of Guelph to conduct an in-depth analysis of this five-year dataset. The goal is to uncover trends that can inform recommendations for farmers. Alongside the comprehensive year-end reports that benchmark participants’ results against their peers, the leadership team has introduced interactive data dashboards. These dashboards empower participants to explore the full dataset themselves, and investigate insights on soil management, planting strategies, fertilizer and crop protection use, and key crop modelling factors -- all tailored by soil type, region, or wheat class. Currently focused on winter wheat, the Great Lakes YEN serves Ontario and the Great Lakes region of the U.S. More than 160 farmers have already signed up for the 2026 program. To stay in the loop and be among the first to hear about 2027 registration, visit the Great Lakes YEN website and join the mailing list: https://greatlakesyen.com/ . Alexandra Dacey is Grain Farmers of Ontario’s agronomy project coordinator. • continued from page 31 Roger Sylvester-Bradley, co-founder of the YEN concept. Several Great Lakes YEN participants had the opportunity to see record-breaking wheat fields up close during the 2025 YEN summer networking tour in the UK.
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