Big Threat of Resistant Weeds
Big Threat of Resistant Weeds. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Line On Agriculture.
Difficult weather conditions this spring left many growers with a compressed planting window. As a result - BASF Herbicide Technical Market Manager Dr. Dan Westberg says there is an increased threat of resistant weeds spreading. Because a large number of acres were planted in a short period of time due to wet weather - he says a number of acres were not treated with a pre-emergence herbicide.
WESTBERG: Using pre-emerge products at planting or before planting is a real critical tool for managing resistant weeds and particularly in soybeans where your post end crop options, if you’re dealing with glyphosate resistance are very limited. If you don’t have that pre down it just leaves a lot of opportunity for having escapes and selecting for more resistance if you are only using glyphosate post.
Westberg says waterhemp pressure is a hot topic in much of the Corn Belt - particularly in Illinois, Missouri and parts of Iowa.
WESTBERG: The University of Illinois just came out and they’re now identified glyphosate resistant water hemp in 11 different counties. Missouri is up to - I believe - 39 different counties with glyphosate resistant water hemp so that’s growing to be a major problem.
Here in the northwest glyphosate resistance can be problem for a number of crops including corn, chickpeas, fruit and nut trees. In the immediate future - growers should think about a fall burndown. Performing a burndown and laying down a residual is preferable over battling weeds with only postemerge applications. Westberg says products powered by Kixor® herbicide technology provide fast burndown and residual control.
WESTBERG: You’re starting clean and you are having the ability to stay clean better. By having a pre-emergence herbicide down it widens your post emergence application window because you kept the weed population down - greatly reduced and it give you a wider window for an effective application post.
For more information - growers can contact their local, authorized BASF retailer or technical representative - or visit KixorHerbicide dot com (www.KixorHerbicide.com) or agproducts dot basf dot us (www.agproducts.basf.us).
That’s today’s Line On Agriculture. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.
