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Managing Weeds: 2007 a
Unique Season
By
Laura Skillman
 PRINCETON,
Ky., (Aug. 1, 2007) – What makes a weed, a weed? Generally, it
is a plant that competes with the crop in a field. This year
some of those weeds were not what you might think. They were
wheat and corn plants.
“I believe this is one of those seasons that is going to stick
in the minds of farmers,” said Jim Martin, weeds science
specialist with the University of Kentucky College of
Agriculture. “It’s been a challenge for people in a lot of
different ways and no doubt weed control has had its moments
too.”
Martin highlighted some of these challenges during UK’s recent
field day at the Research and Education Center in Princeton. One
such challenge was in destroying freeze-damaged wheat to replant
another crop. Wheat and some grasses can be killed very easily
when it is young but becomes more difficult to kill once it has
begun tillering. That was the state of Kentucky’s wheat crop
when the freeze took place in April.
Martin said having to kill fields of wheat was not something
he’d dealt with before. Some herbicide options worked better
than others, he noted, and required patience.
The freeze also killed some cornfields but not every plant in
the field, so these also had to be managed in order to replant.
For people who followed the strategy of using non-glyphosate
resistant corn in their early planted fields, in case of a
freeze, that strategy paid off. The field could be replanted
with a glyphosate resistant variety then sprayed with the
chemical to destroy any of the remaining plants from the first
planting.
Farmers who planted resistant varieties had to turn to other
options that were not as simple. In many cases the damaged corn
didn’t have a lot of growth on it, lessening the chances of some
chemicals working effectively. These were more effective if
farmers allowed the surviving corn to recover somewhat and begin
some regrowth before spraying it with an herbicide.
Other farmers did nothing and felt like they could manage the
damaged corn fields simply by having their row cleaners rip out
the damaged plants as they replanted the field, Martin said.
This strategy did not work as well as some had hoped.
In terms of more traditional weeds, marestail was a problem this
year in soybeans. Martin said this could be attributed to the
warm February and March that allowed the weed to grow more
rapidly than in a more normal year, making it more difficult to
combat. Then, if farmers used 2-4D to control it and sprayed
close to the April freeze, they probably did not get the control
they would have under more spring-like temperatures. Rescue
treatments don’t work well in trying to combat this weed.
Wheat goes a long way in managing marestail, Martin said.
Putting wheat into the cropping rotation can help alleviate the
weed in many fields.
“It’s not a cure-all, but a good stand of wheat goes a long way
in suppressing marestail,” he said.
Weed management can be challenging, but UK specialists work to
provide the latest information for Kentucky’s farmers.
Information on weed management can be found at local offices of
the UK Cooperative Extension Service.
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Contact: Jim Martin, 270-365-7541, ext. 203
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The UK College
of Agriculture, through its land-grant mission, reaches across
the commonwealth with teaching, research and extension
to enhance the lives of Kentuckians. |
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Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service |
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