Stine^® set to offer customers dicamba testing free of charge again in 2022

Last summer, Stine offered dicamba damage testing at no charge to grower customers to help them identify whether their fields had been impacted by off-target movement of dicamba. Again this year, Stine is offering to pay for processing of samples to test for the presence of dicamba for concerned customers.

2021 dicamba testing results
Unfortunately, the use of post-applied dicamba continues to present a significant amount of risk to both growers and applicators. This is something we confirmed through our program last year. In 2021, roughly 75% of the samples submitted from across the United States tested positive for the presence of dicamba. Specific results follow.

• Taking out samples that could not be processed due to sample prep errors, we had 322 total dicamba test samples processed. Of those:
  • 239 tested positive for the presence of dicamba in the sample (75%).
  • The lowest detected presence was 1 ppb.
  • The highest amount detected was 93.9 ppb.
  • The overall average among all positives was 7.6 ppb.
  • Samples were received from 16 states.
• In addition, a third-party testing lab (different than the one that we used for our samples in 2021) disclosed to us that last summer their dicamba positivity rate for foliar samples submitted was 88%.

This testing program clearly indicates that the damage we’re seeing to soybeans throughout the country is not due to drought or other environmental stressors, as some may suggest. In most cases (75% in 2021) dicamba movement was the culprit behind field damage in the fields we tested.

2022 expectations
Despite several states implementing additional dicamba spray restrictions for the 2022 growing season, we anticipate that this year we will once again be dealing with lots of dicamba damage. For grower customers who are interested in participating in Stine’s 2022 dicamba testing program, reach out to your local Stine sales rep or regional sales agronomist who can walk you through testing protocols for the program. By obtaining and submitting timely samples for testing, you can get a clear picture of the situation.

As always, at Stine, we believe that soybean growers need as many options as possible to achieve sound and effective weed control. We remain committed to offering our customers a multitude of options, all packaged in high-yielding genetics, to ensure your fields are positioned for success now and in the future.