Rotation Relevance? A 50-year Perspective
How relevant is crop rotation today for corn and soybean production with our modern varieties, regular fungicide applications and better soil management? Are corn and soybean yield gains with rotation in the Corn Belt just as likely now as 50 years ago? This presentation will highlight experiences from long-term rotation studies in Indiana (since 1975) and other regions. The consistency of corn and soybean yield response to rotation in different tillage systems and changing climates (i.e. growing season weather conditions) will be compared. Soil C and N changes over time will be highlighted. Finally, I will provide my perspective on whether rotation research is still relevant. Should Purdue and other Corn Belt universities simply retire this kind of “old-school” research?
Speaker

Tony Vyn
Dr. Tony J. Vyn is a recently retired professor from the Agronomy Department at Purdue University. Officially, his title is the “Wallace Emeritus Professor of Crop Sciences” because he held a chaired faculty position as the Henry A. Wallace Chair in Crop Sciences from 2018 to his retirement in December, 2023. Unofficially, he is a part-time cash crop farmer in Ontario and Indiana. Tony grew up on a hog and cash crop farm near Ridgetown in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. He earned his degrees from the University of Guelph, (in Guelph, Ontario) after studying biology for 2 years at Trinity Christian College in Chicago. He was a faculty member in the Crop Science Department at Guelph from 1987 until he joined the Agronomy Department faculty at Purdue University in 1998. During his 25-year career at Purdue, he and his research team members studied the physiology of crop (primarily corn) responses to tillage, rotations, nutrient rate/placement/timing, abiotic stress factors, and plant populations with modern and era hybrids. He loved to find out when and how a plant change to management occurred so that he could better explain any final yield responses. Tony served as Co-Chair of the Indiana Crop Adviser Conference from 2003 to 2022. Dr. Vyn and his wife are blessed with 4 children who live with their respective families in the USA or Canada.