Weed control considerations in almond orchards

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Weed control, management, ecology, and minutia

Author: Brad Hanson

Published on: June 19, 2011

I spoke last week at the Central San Joaquin Valley Summer Almond Meeting (in Merced, CA) as part of a program that encompassed the almond industry, insect pests, disease managemment and weed control among other topics. The organizer, UCCE Farm Advisor David Doll, asked me to talk about herbicide selection, maximizing efficacy, and minimizing drift.

It was a good meeting and I thought I'd share my slides for others to read and consider.

(Click on the slide to open in a full screen view. Click on the arrow on the right side of the frame or use the arrow keys to scroll through the slides)

Related info:
A few weed control comments and follow up questions on The Almond Doctor here: http://www.thealmonddoctor.com/2011/06/glyphosate-resistant-weed-control.html

I also posted a related publication on horseweed and fleabane here: http://ucanr.org/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=5152

Take care,
Brad

Tags: herbicide chemistry (45), orchards and vineyards (101)

Comments: 2

Comments:

by Matthew Thompson

on June 20, 2011 at 8:09 AM

I attended the recent Almond meeting in Merced and agree that it was a very good meeting. The presentations were excellent. Its also good to see such enthusiasm on the part of the presenters, someone's going to have to carry on the spirit after Walt Bentley retires! My question; Are there any weed susceptibility charts that include the newer contact herbicides such as Treevix, Matrix and Venue?

by Brad Hanson

on June 20, 2011 at 11:20 AM

Matthew,
Thanks for your comment. Walt is one of a kind.

We are planning an update to the weed susceptiblity chart - it has been a little slow in coming due to some more urgent deadlines. We are hoping to do a fairly major overhaul of the underlying database and my goal is to be done by the end of the year. For those that don't know, we have an online susceptiblity chart here: http://info.ucanr.org/weed_sept/

Matrix (rimsulfuron) is on that list. In genereal, the other two herbicides you asked about Treevix (saflufenacil) and Venue (pyraflufen) are contact materials that will only control emerged, small broadleaf weeds. They may burn the tops of large established broadleaf weeds and perennial weeds but will probably not provide satisfactory control of those plants.

On the bright side, both of those herbicides kill plant via a different mechanism than glyphosate and should control some of our important glyphosate-resistant broadleaf weeds.