Monitoring cane at the mill to improve nitrogen management on the farm : final report CTA029

Abstract

The project originally had a third objective, namely to “Develop promising leads in rapid and cost effective analyses of N compounds in the mill juice stream to a “proof-of-concept” stage.” Instrumentation issues and industry developments with respect to installation on on-line NIR infrastructure meant that this third objective was transferred to the project CTA045, which is on going. Objective 1 was addressed via laboratory analyses of cane sourced from a wide range of experimental studies in different seasons at a range of sites, involving variation in N fertiliser inputs, sugarcane varieties, irrigation inputs, and other agronomic variables. Objective 2 was addressed via a series of grower-managed on-farm trials in which N fertiliser inputs were varied above and below the grower’s “normal” management and the results were interpreted in relation to additional information obtained from soil analyses and amino-N analyses of the cane at harvest time.