September 06, 2012
Products such as Sharpen® herbicide help eliminate winter annuals and provide a clean slate for spring planting
RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC, September 6, 2012 -- The months between this year’s harvest and next spring’s planting are prime time for winter annual weeds to take over fields. In the Midwest, that can mean the return of tough-to-control weeds such as glyphosate-resistant marestail, which can cause a frustrating and costly headache.
Marestail is easiest to control when it’s small. However, when it grows taller than six inches, effective control with herbicides becomes much more difficult. A single surviving plant can produce as many as 200,000 seeds, exponentially increasing seeds in the seed bank and making marestail a weed farmers can expect to deal with year after year if not managed correctly.1
Farmers aiming to avoid this situation – as well as control escaped weeds from the season – should consider implementing a fall burndown program.
“No farmer wants to start the spring with a field full of established weeds,” said Dan Westberg, Ph.D., Technical Market Manager, BASF. “A fall burndown lessens the amount of spring fieldwork needed and allows farmers an earlier opportunity to start planting.”
Eliminating weeds, slowing resistance
Dense populations of winter annuals can physically interfere with planting and may slow soil drying, limiting the amount of time available for spring field operations.2 Eliminating these weeds helps farmers plant earlier and gives crops more time to maximize their potential.
“Regardless of what they’ve experienced this year, with a fall burndown, growers will be able to start fresh in the spring,” said Westberg. “A fall burndown also helps farmers manage resistant weeds because it gives growers the chance to apply a different herbicide site of action to their fields.”
With herbicide-resistant weeds such as glyphosate-resistant marestail spreading throughout the region, weed management experts are more adamant than ever that farmers use a complete program that includes the use of multiple herbicide sites of action.
Fast, effective results
One option for a fall burndown is a fast, effective tool like Sharpen® herbicide, which is powered by Kixor® herbicide technology. It has been shown to work three to five times faster than glyphosate and 2,4-D.
“Controlling tough winter annuals in the fall allows planting flexibility come spring,” Westberg said. “With the immense crop flexibility of Sharpen herbicide, farmers are able to plant the crops in the spring that can provide them the best return on their investment.”
With innovative solutions, technical support and educational tools, BASF is a farmer’s No. 1 partner for managing weed resistance by providing more corn and soybean herbicide sites of action than any other crop protection company. BASF is committed to providing farmers with new chemistries and products to help maximize their yield potential and proactively manage resistant weeds.
For more information on herbicide best practices, visit http://on.basf.com/weedbp.
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About the Crop Protection division
With sales of € 4.1 billion in 2011, BASF’s Crop Protection division is a leader in crop protection and a strong partner to the farming industry providing well-established and innovative fungicides, insecticides and herbicides. Farmers use these products and services to improve crop yields and crop quality. Other uses include public health, structural/urban pest control, turf and ornamental plants, vegetation management, and forestry. BASF aims to turn knowledge rapidly into market success. The vision of BASF’s Crop Protection division is to be the world’s leading innovator, optimizing agricultural production, improving nutrition, and thus enhancing the quality of life for a growing world population. Further information can be found on the web at www.agro.basf.com or follow us on twitter: www.twitter.com/basfagro.
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BASF Corporation, headquartered in Florham Park, New Jersey, is the North American affiliate of BASF SE, Ludwigshafen, Germany. BASF has more than 16,000 employees in North America, and had sales of $20 billion in 2011. For more information about BASF’s North American operations, visit www.basf.us.
BASF is the world’s leading chemical company: The Chemical Company. Its portfolio ranges from chemicals, plastics, performance products and crop protection products to oil and gas. We combine economic success, social responsibility and environmental protection. Through science and innovation we enable our customers in almost all industries to meet the current and future needs of society. Our products and system solutions contribute to conserving resources, ensuring healthy food and nutrition and helping to improve the quality of life. We have summed up this contribution in our corporate purpose: We create chemistry for a sustainable future. BASF posted sales of about €73.5 billion in 2011 and had more than 111,000 employees as of the end of the year. Further information on BASF is available on the Internet at www.basf.com.
1 Peterson, D., & Shoup, D. (2011). Weed of the month: marestail. Retrieved July 5, 2012, from http://www.agronomy.ksu.edu/doc3491.ashx.
2 Johnson, B., & Legleiter, T. (2012). Will winter annual weeds be an issue this year? Retrieved July 5, 2012, from http://www3.ag.purdue.edu/btny/weedscience/documents/WA_Burndown_final.pdf.
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