Melissa Miller, project director for the Iowa Nitrogen Initiative, will be a featured speaker at upcoming Iowa State University (ISU) Crop Advantage Series meetings this month, highlighting the program’s nitrogen fertilizer application consultation tool, known as N-FACT. 

Miller will discuss how farmers can use the tool to save money while meeting their corn’s nitrogen needs in the 2026 growing season. She will speak in Ankeny on Jan. 21, Iowa City on Jan. 27 and Carroll on Jan. 29. 

Additional program sessions led by ISU staff and guest speakers will cover a wide range of topics, including input management, weather and weed challenges, soybean seeding rates, farm succession planning, soil and water resource management and cy­­bersecurity.  

The ISU Crop Advantage Series provides current, research-based crop production information designed to help growers make informed management decisions.

The Iowa Nitrogen Initiative is a public-private partnership that designs, executes and interprets hundreds of scientifically sound on-farm experiments each year to advance cropping systems science across the state.

One of the newest tools developed through the initiative and led by ISU in partnership with public and private organizations is N-FACT, launched in early 2025. 

This tool is designed to help Iowa farmers make informed nitrogen application decisions during the growing season.

The tool factors in various field-level production variables and recommends an optimum range of nitrogen application rates. The goal is to help farmers balance productivity, environmental stewardship and input costs. 

Iowa farmers can explore on-farm rate trials online, input key data to determine their optimum nitrogen rate and compare scenarios if conditions change. 

N-FACT leverages thousands of data points from hundreds of field trials, which include factors such as field location, weather, residual soil nitrogen, estimated planting dates, and input and commodity prices. 

To learn more from Miller about N-FACT and strategies for saving money while meeting crop nitrogen needs, register for one of the meetings at www.regcytes.extension.iastate.edu/cas/.

• Wednesday, Jan. 21, 8:15 a.m.-4:15 p.m., FFA Enrichment Center, Ankeny.

• Tuesday, Jan. 27, 8:30 a.m.-4:15 p.m., Johnson County Extension Office, Iowa City.

• Thursday, Jan. 29, 7:30 a.m.-5:15 p.m., Swan Lake Education Center, Carroll.