There were a number of reports of ryegrass escaping burndown in fields that either will soon be planted to corn or just had been planted to corn. Thankfully this issue seems less of a problem than a year ago. In most cases the ryegrass escaped glyphosate + dicamba early burndown. Paraquat application has the best probability of controlling ryegrass that has escaped early burndown. Continue reading
With the planting season started, many people are thinking about using Gramoxone (paraquat) as a burndown for many weeds present at planting. Gramoxone is a very good broad-spectrum herbicide that has been the go to for burndown of many winter and summer annual broadleaf weeds. With Palmer amaranth starting to emerge, Gramoxone is the only sure thing that will control it. However, it is less consistent controlling some weeds like horseweed (marestail). Continue reading
We have had the opportunity to observe field and demo burndowns around West Tennessee. In general, going back “old school” and applying glyphosate alone provided very effective burndown. This includes applications made back in mid-March when night time temperatures were below freezing (Picture 1). Continue reading
Increase in input costs and lower relative commodity prices compared to last year may tempt some to forgo using a PRE this spring. Since glyphosate and dicamba have actually gone down in price, it may be tempting to try this combination near planting, then hope that dicamba will provide enough residual weed control to hold until those herbicides can be applied again early POST. Continue reading
It is cover crop burndown time. There is no one size fits all recommendation for cover crop control. It really depends on the environment and the cover crop species in the field. With respect to environment, cover crop burndown can be tricky during periods of long stretches of saturated soil conditions. This is particularly true with systemic herbicides where translocation of those herbicides to growing points can become limited. Continue reading
There are three newer corn herbicide premixes available: Acuron GT, Armezon PRO and Resicore. Below are some thoughts on these newer premixes as well as some that have been around for a spell: Continue reading
This spring some fields seem to be infested more heavily with wild garlic, grape hyacinth and in a few cases, star-of-Bethlehem. These three weeds, in the Lily family, are often mistaken for each other as they all derive from bulbs and are low-growing perennials. Continue reading
Prickly sida or tea weed has increasingly become more of an issue in soybeans. There are two reasons for this. First, the Group 15 herbicides (Dual Mag, Warrant, Zidua) are the most common PRE-applied herbicides utilized. Though that group of herbicides provides good residual control of pigweed and grasses, it provides no help on sida. Second, is that glyphosate nor dicamba has ever been very effective on this weed. The only POST option that can give some control is Liberty. However, even Liberty is limited to controlling only very small (<3”) prickly sida. Continue reading