b'5 Things to Know About InoculantsIF YOUVE WORKEDwith seed treatments, youve considered inoculants at some point. But why? What makes an inoculant necessary to use, and why should you care?When you use an inoculant, it starts a silent symbiotic process below your feet. Youre not going to know its happening, but your legumes will. I know what youre thinkingas a seed professional, you know everything there is about inoculants. I want to expand on that knowledge, so Ive included five facts you might not have realized about inoculants. 1. Rhizobia found in inoculants provide over half of soybeans necessary nitro-gen. If you dont have soil filled with healthy rhizobia, wheres all your nitrogen coming from? Rhizobia provide 60% of the necessary nitrogen to fuel soybean growth. While you might not see it happening, its a silent process thats necessary for growth and increased production.2.Use an inoculant more than once. Yes, after using an inoculant once, youre going to see better results. But are you seeing the best results if you only use it once? No! While the rhizobia will continue living in the soil after your first use of an inoculant, its not there trying to help your soybean crop anymore. Its just trying to survive in its environment at that point, instead of helping you get the best yield possible. Using an inoculant each time you grow soybeans will increase your yield and nitrogen fixation. 3. Sometimes the most bang for your buck isnt the best solution. This is a mis-conception I hear a lot! Well, all inoculants are the same, right? Ill just go for the cheap-est solution. Not all inoculants are the same, and it really comes down to a companys quality parameters. Its important to research and ask a few questions: Does this com-pany have a fresh product every year? Do they verify label claims and colony counts? Do they compare their products with competitors? These questions of quality can find you the best possible product. 4. Not all inoculants are meant for the same crops. Theres a whole slew of things that fall into the inoculant camp, but typically in the world of seed, an inoculant falls into a rhizobia bacteria. But, theres a different species of rhizobia to go with different species of legumestheres asoybean group, a chickpea group, a peanut group, and so many more. Its important to do research to ensure youre getting the right inoculant for your crop. 5. Rhizobia can die! Its not something we can control, but Mother Nature certainly can kill off your rhizobia through weather events. Last year, when we had really bad flooding, a lot of that killed the rhizobia in the soil. Its important to remember that rhizobia are living things, and if its not stored properly or a major environmental event happens, it can die or lose effec-tiveness. For success, make sure you have enough organic matter in your soil and take into account all the fungicides and insecticides that youre putting on your seed. JUSTIN CLARKBASF TECHNICAL FIELD LEAD, SEED TREATMENTSjustin.clark@basf.comagriculture.basf.us/crop-protection/products/seed-treatment.html18/ SEEDWORLD.COMJANUARY 2022'