| CropTec
Special Black-grass
Management Clinic for
CropTec
The experience of more than 15 seasons of applied
research from Agrii’s leading Stow Longa Black-grass
Technology Centre will be transported from Huntingdon to
Peterborough in a special management clinic at this
year’s CropTec.
grii head of
agronomy, Colin
Lloyd who has run
the Stow Longa
programme since
2000 and trials
manager, Steve Corbett will be
manning the ‘Colin’s Corner’ clinic
on Stand 120 to bring their wealth
of practical understanding to bear
on visitors’ particular black-grass
problems.
“If our work has taught us one
thing it’s that there are no simple
solutions to bad black-grass,”
stressed Mr Lloyd. “Instead,
success depends on stacking the
most appropriate cultural and
chemical controls for the farm and
season.”
Over the years, Stow Longa
research has identified more than
a dozen important fundamentals of
effective black-grass control,
including:
Using a rotational plough in the
right way at the right time;
Delaying wheat drilling until late
October where possible;
Moving to spring drilling if
autumn conditions prevent late
drilling;
Employing two (or more) spring
crops in a row, if necessary;
Using cover crops to improve
the chances of decent late autumn
or spring seedbeds;
Sowing the most competitive
wheat varieties;
Moving as little soil as possible
at drilling to wake up the least
amount of weed seed;
Using barley rather than wheat
for early autumn sowing;
Sowing the most competitive
barley varieties;
Making the best use of
glyphosate to eliminate weed
flushes ahead of drilling;
Creating firm and fine seedbeds
that give the best pre-em herbicide
activity;
Stacking and sequencing
residual pre-em and early post-em
herbicides carefully; and,
Maintaining the best possible
weed control in all cereal breaks.
Even the worst infestations can
be overcome with the correct
management,” Colin Lloyd pointed
out. “But only if the right
techniques are applied in
combinations matched to the
A
individual farm challenge with
enough flexibility to suit the
conditions and, above all,
sufficient patience and
persistence.”
“Through our CropTec clinic we
are setting out to help as many
visitors as we can with individual
guidance from our extensive
cultivation systems, variety
competitiveness, cover cropping,
rotational and herbicide
application research,” Steve
Corbett explained.
“By bringing our Stow Longa
research to Peterborough in this
personal way, we look forward to
sharing its findings directly with
even more growers than we can
accommodate at our extended
series of Huntingdon open days.”
Win 10ha of New Very High
Yielding Spring Barley in Agrii
Stand Competition
Visitors to the Agrii stand at
CropTec will have the opportunity
to win two tonnes of seed of new,
very high yielding malting barley,
Laureate for 2017 planting
courtesy of Syngenta and
MasterSeeds.
Yielding only fractionally behind
RGT Planet in the latest five-year
AHDB Recommended List trial
data, Laureate has the advantage
of being non-GN for the widest
market suitability.
The Syngenta variety is being
registered across Europe for the
broadest market appeal and is
currently under test by IBD for
both brewing and malt distilling to
give it significantly greater
marketability than current malting
standard, Propino.
“As well as all the right quality
and yield characteristics, Laureate
has the highest untreated grain
yield on the RL courtesy of its very
strong across-the-board disease
resistance as part of an excellent
agronomic package,” noted Agrii
national seeds manager, Barry
Barker.
“The two tonnes of seed we are
offering in our free-to-enter
CropTec competition will be
sufficient for just over 10 ha of
planting at normal rates, making it
a very attractive prize for anyone
planning to grow spring barley in
2017.”
18 | Farming Monthly | November 2016
Defy 3D Nozzle – a key
component in your attack
on blackgrass this
autumn
The unique Defy 3D
inclined nozzle was
developed by Pentair Hypro
and Syngenta specifically
for the application of preemergence black-grass
herbicides. It has been
tuned to eliminate the
smallest driftable droplets,
boosting performance
whilst at the same time
significantly reducing spray
drift.
uccessful
application is a
key component of
achieving the
critical 97%
control that is
needed to reduce the weed
population and enhanced drift
reduction really helps spray
operators to manage their autumn
workload when spraying days are
scarce.
Syngenta trials using
Defy+Liberator have showed that
applications with the Defy 3D
nozzle reduces drift by 60-75% as
well as increasing black-grass
control by 3-6% compared with a
conventional flat fan nozzle.
S
Performance has been
excellent at 100 l/ha water,
beating a conven