Sugar Producer

March 2022

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world's leading developer of genetic sugarbeet performance traits. In 2020, KWS introduced CR+, a new source of Cercospora tolerance that offers sugarbeet growers protection and performance to ensure productivity (covered in the May 2020 issue of Sugar Producer). Betaseed hybrids that carry this trait offer growers additional tolerance to Cercospora disease while maximizing and securing yield, and offering the possibility of reducing fungicide applications. The promise of less spraying was enough to convince Askegaard to dedicate several acres to hybrids with the CR+ trait in 2021. Among his 650 acres of beets, he planted 190 acres of the new seed trait and calls the results "amazing." "The CR+ rows looked really clean compared to the others," says Askegaard. "The visual difference was significant; there was just not a heck of a lot of Cercsopora in those plants." Even more encouraging, this reduction in Cercospora has led Askegaard to skip several of the spraying passes for acres with the CR+ trait. "We have only sprayed the CR+ rows twice versus four times for our traditional rows," Askegaard says as he nears the finish line of the 2021 growing season. "Based on what I'm seeing, those plants won't need any more spraying at all, even as we move into a fifth treatment for the others." Perhaps the biggest endorsement of the CR+ trait comes when Askegaard is asked about his plans for 2022. In short, he is all in: "I'll plant as much CR+ as I can get my hands on," he says. "This will be a significant tool in our toolbox going forward." Yields are important, but Askegaard notes the biggest draw to planting the CR+ trait is to get out of the sprayer and on with life. He says his goal is to take his weekends back and spend more time at the lake with his two young children and his wife. n WWW.SUGARPRODUCER.COM 13 "We're a busy family," says Ben Askegaard, pic- tured with his wife Molly and their children. "I have better things to do than to sit in a sprayer all summer."

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