"Best?"

[ado089]

Enough is enough. These systems, and there are many of them, use one or all of the following principles. Seed primers to give young plants a shot of esential nutrients to get going, if you beleive in this make sure they contain a good dose of zinc. Zinc drives germination and growth hormone production. Second is the in crop stress releiver. This is generaly a balanced blend plus micros apllied with or near herbicide, hail or moisture stress. These prodcuts are desinged to give the plant a "snack" in order to tide them over until the entire sytem recovers from the stress shock. Be careful with these as they can "heat up" your chemical. Third is using organic acids to modify the soil chemistry/physics in furrow. By adding these material you are creating a pH buffer and modifying the cation carrying capacity of the imediate area. This causes more water to be held in the soil and encourages microbial growth and activity, I think some products may add suggar or starch to accelerate and amplify this effect. My advice is to get these product in furrow even if they suggest you can broadcast it. The fourth is a little more out there but it is a basicaly a spreading agent that you spray on the soil in orderd to break the surface tension of water to encourage more and deeper water infiltration. Are these products snake oil? Probably not. Are they right for everyone? I doubt it. These products in one form or another have been around for a long time but are not wide spread because they are difficult to understand and very situation specific in their applications, therefore they are not a fit for everyone. My advise is to identify if you have a problem and then seek out a product to solve it. Another note is that by using zero till for 10 years you will likely start to see alot of the same results as some of the soil modification products. No matter what the product claim don't cut much more than 10-15% of your normal/recomended fertility program and monitor the results with a benchmark soil test. This includes ortho phosphate, ESN, jumpstart, Avail, Agrotain, foliar top ups and any other product that claims to be more efficient. Also be cautious about products that cost less than about $3-4/ac and claim under 7-10% yield gain. This is phycological pivot point and the results are very difficult to measure or notice. Good products cost good money. Hope this helps.

[furrowtickler]

Well said ado.

[grgsrvc]

I don't think I could ever say it as well
Ado.

"do you have a problem? do you know what
the problem is? will you do something to
fix the problem?"

[makar]

on a off shoot subject someone mentioned magnetic seed treaters. A uncle never used them but always swore seeding to magnetic north direction made a huge difference. That was a few years ago, i cant remember what drill he had that could lay the seeds in a line pointing in a straight line germ wise.