- Author: Marie Jasieniuk
- Posted by: Gale Perez
Herbicides are the main means of controlling weeds. Recently, there has been increasing concern over the potential impacts of climate change, specifically, increasing temperatures and elevated carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations, on the sensitivity of weeds to herbicides. A postdoctoral fellow in my lab, Maor Matzrafi, investigated the response of horseweed and lambsquarters to treatment with glyphosate under the higher temperatures and CO2 levels that are predicted to exist in northern California around 2050. Maor showed that the sensitivity of both weeds to glyphosate was reduced in response to increased temperature, elevated CO2 level, and the combination of both factors. He also found that...
- Author: Thomas Getts
Heat is something that many Californians are used to, and live with for several months out of the year, but prolonged triple digit heat is not something I am used to in my corner of the state. Sure it gets hot up here in Lassen County, but there is most often a place to retreat from the heat.
A couple of weeks ago I was feeling hot, sweltering in the triple digits of Canyonlands National Park in Utah, which in all honesty would be considered a moderate day for my colleagues down in the Imperial Valley. But, I live in northern California, and what I was seeing made me think I was hallucinating from the heat. I did a double take because a good portion of the vegetation surrounding the river was turning brown and dropping their...
- Author: Whitney Brim-DeForest
- Re-posted by: Gale Perez
There are two (2) new posts on the UC Rice Blog written by Whitney Brim-DeForest, Cooperative Extension Rice Advisor.
/span>- Author: Richard Smith
- Posted by: Gale Perez
In vegetable production, growers cultivate most of the bed leaving only a 4-inch wide uncultivated band around the seedline. Weeds not controlled by preemergent herbicides or cultural practices in the uncultivated band are ultimately controlled by hand. Labor costs have increased and availability has decreased in the last 4 – 5 years which has spurred grower interest in automated weeder technology. In the last two to three years, automated weeders have become available in the Salinas Valley. All current machines were developed and manufactured in Europe: the Robovator developed in Denmark by Poulsen Engineering and distributed by Pacific Ag Rentals (Salinas); the Steketee IC developed in the Netherlands and distributed by Sutton...
- Posted by: Gale Perez
From Brian German at AgNet West :: April 17, 2018
California rice growers will need to be on the lookout for two new problematic weed species this year. One of the species is called rough barnyardgrass (Echinochloa muricata) and the other is known as coast cockspur grass (Echinochloa walteri). The discovery of the weeds came after two growers having difficulty controlling weeds reached out to University of California researchers for assistance with identification.
“I took it to the Herbarium and they confirmed that both of the samples I took down there were Echinochloa muricata, which is related to the...