With tight crop budgets continuing, Brad Carlson, longtime Extension educator with the University of Minnesota, looked back over several years of actual farm records from Minnesota farmers. He found six possible ways to cut costs in 2025.
“When I looked at 2016, annual fertilizer costs for the 20% most profitable farms was $138 per acre, but for the least profitable 20%, it was $177 per acre — a 28% difference,” he says. “That was a much higher difference than for any other input.”
Carlson looked at corn acres in southeast, south-central, southwest and west-central Minnesota. The trend has continued every year since, topping out at a 33% difference in 2023, with high group vs. low group fertilizer costs at $217 vs. $289 per acre, respectively.
Recently, Carlson and Fabian Fernandez, a UM agronomist and researcher, kicked off a winter virtual series on strategic farming by discussing reasons behind this data. Carlson explains that the most-profitable farms may spend less on fertilizer for corn because they avoid these six things:
1. Applying too much N per acre. If you’re applying beyond the point where the last pound of nitrogen applied produces just enough extra corn to pay for itself, you are probably applying too much. “We suggest applying based on state recommendations for your area,” Carlson says. “If you are applying more than that amount, ask yourself why you are doing it.”
Fernandez’s research from as far back as 2014 shows that if you apply more than the economic optimum rate, you leave added soil nitrate behind, equal pound per pound to extra pounds applied.
2. Masking unsound application methods with increased N rates. For example, applying N in the fall without a nitrification inhibitor and upping the spring sidedress rate to compensate is just throwing good money away. How and when you apply nitrogen matters, the researchers say.
3. Applying P and K at crop removal rates when soil tests are already high. The key here is that rates are already high, Carlson says. If you continue applying, you will likely continue building phosphorus and potassium levels and see no monetary return.
4. Split-applying N when there is no advantage. Purdue Extension specialists Robert Nielsen and Jim Camberato spent several summers doing split-application trials on farmer fields. They discovered that sometimes it paid, but more often, it didn’t pay.
“If you aren’t on sandy soils or elsewhere where losses could be high, you are likely spending more on application costs without seeing benefits,” Carlson says.
5. Choosing “premium” fertilizers at premium costs. A pound of K or P is a pound of K or P to the plant — it doesn’t care how the nutrients got there, Carlson says. Base choices on cost per pound of K or P, not on claims of enhanced performance.
Fernandez notes, however, that polymer-coated urea doesn’t fall in this category. It is coated with a polymer to reduce losses and has shown value in trials.
6. Paying for fertilizer advisory technology. If you use drone mapping, in-season soil sampling or tissue testing, how is it helping save money? If these services end up in recommendations you don’t follow, what have you gained? Be honest about potential costs and benefits of these services, Carlson says.