As producers finish harvest and turn their attention to the 2017 crop season, the University of Tennessee Institute of Agriculture is releasing a new tool that will allow farmers to quickly access information on yield performance and disease resistance for more than 200 soybean cultivars.
“Seeds are one of the most expensive purchases a farmer makes each year, and the choices are increasingly complex,” says Heather Kelly, plant pathologist with the UT Department of Entomology and Plant Pathology. “Our new searchable database will make this abundance of information more manageable and help producers quickly and easily find answers.”
The searchable database, which is available online at UTCrops.com, features disease and yield information on soybean cultivars tested in County Standardized Trials and replicated small plots at AgResearch and Education Centers and on-farm locations. Users can search and sort the results by herbicide trait, maturity group, brand name, cultivar, level of resistance to Frogeye Leaf Spot, or yield.
Where applicable, yield results are separately listed for high disease pressure locations, low to moderate disease pressure locations, and when planted behind wheat. Farmers can also compare a cultivar’s yields when treated with a fungicide to when it was left untreated. The site also supplies information on cultivar resistance to other diseases, such as stem canker, sudden death syndrome cercospora leaf blight and targe spot, as well as soybean cyst nematode reaction.
While this information is available in UTIA’s Soybean Variety Performance Reports, the search query feature of the new online database allows users to quickly sort through the disease and yield data across different herbicide traits and maturity groups.
“This site is by no means a replacement for our Variety Performance Reports. Instead it will be a great first-step in helping producers efficiently find the information they seek,” says Kelly, who compiled the database. She adds that UTIA specialists are working to create a more comprehensive searchable database for soybean cultivars as well as other crops. At present, this additional soybean variety information can be found at
http://utcrops.com/soybean/varieties_soy.htm