The history of "Blackgrass" and its control before sprays?
- Thread starter Pilatus
- Start date
4course
Member
- Location
- north yorks
its also interesting for an old bugger like me as time is showing that ploughing and rotation and avoiding alot if not most of the fads of the last 30 years has not been a mistake despite the pressure from my now blackgrass ridden peers . ( tounge in cheek)
Princess Pooper
Member
- Location
- East Mids
An international perspective.... http://www.cabi.org/isc/datasheet/4360
dannewhouse
Member
- Location
- huddersfield
very interesting, we have always ploughed everything but my granddads rotation was WB WW, not really a rotation, mine isn't much better really as its basically WW WB WW WB <or similar and then 3 years of grass unless BG is a problem so I grass it sooner.
we live very near ICI (Syngenta nowadays) and only sprayed once per year, Autumn kite is the latest quote from years gone by. our opinion is they sent that much chemical up there chimney they did our spraying for us! Barb wire didn't last much over a year though also blamed the chemicals!
nothing like the barb wire outlasting the stakes nowadays or pre em + post em + 3 spray passes in the spring yes yields have gone up a lot but so has spending?
we live very near ICI (Syngenta nowadays) and only sprayed once per year, Autumn kite is the latest quote from years gone by. our opinion is they sent that much chemical up there chimney they did our spraying for us! Barb wire didn't last much over a year though also blamed the chemicals!
nothing like the barb wire outlasting the stakes nowadays or pre em + post em + 3 spray passes in the spring yes yields have gone up a lot but so has spending?
casemx 270
Member
- Location
- East midlands
I remember Autumn Kite sprayed acres and acres of it
dannewhouse
Member
- Location
- huddersfield
was it the answer they describe to me?
I still have the jug for measuring other chemicals out, the artwork has washed off but the numbers are moulded in so still works a treat.
warksfarmer
Member
Nothing here until about 6 years ago. Winter cropping is now impossible for cereals unless you throw the kitchen sink at it herbicide wise. However both spring barley and spring linseed are virtually (not quite) clean of it with single herbicide passes. I can see grass as the long term solution though.
- Location
- Bury St Edmunds
Every decision I have made on the arable farm has revolved around blackgrass for the last 5 years ( and should of for the last 10) .
- Location
- Near Colchester
To get back to the OP....
late 70's, Chlorotoluron (Dicurane) had first come out to control grass weeds in wheat, it was very expensive I remember my boss at the time saying, but not as pricey as Roundup which was so expensive we still raked up dry couch grass roots into heaps and burnt them by hand.
Unfortunately many wheat varieties were not tolerant of Dicurane and so Hytane (isoproturon) was used, this was also in Tolkan as far as I remember and the whole arable staff went red with the 'free' Tolkan jumpers, we bought a pallet of Hytane or possibly prebane (terbutryn) which cost the farm more than a brand new small family car in the early 80's
By then I was on a large arable farm in N Herts which had no animals, the rotation was 5 cereals and then rape or beans, we rotationally ploughed, direct drilled everything else and had no trouble whatsoever with blackgrass.
We burnt every inch we were allowed to burn (the stupid 25 acre rule came in which meant that some bigger fields had strips of grass where there had been sub-dividing firebreaks)
Meanwhile down here in Sunny Essex where I now farm, IPU resistant blackgrass had been discovered in the next-door village where two large farms grew wheat after wheat, then it all went pear-shaped.
Those farms are still struggling with the weed as am I as I took over some of one of thems land, rotation is helping us all out but stacking chems is not my pigeon.
I have ploughed out a couple of small fields on my original farm from permanent pasture to help with worm burdens in the sheep and cattle.
They don't need quite such a large chemical input to control blackgrass as there isn't any and we are careful not to add any either.
late 70's, Chlorotoluron (Dicurane) had first come out to control grass weeds in wheat, it was very expensive I remember my boss at the time saying, but not as pricey as Roundup which was so expensive we still raked up dry couch grass roots into heaps and burnt them by hand.
Unfortunately many wheat varieties were not tolerant of Dicurane and so Hytane (isoproturon) was used, this was also in Tolkan as far as I remember and the whole arable staff went red with the 'free' Tolkan jumpers, we bought a pallet of Hytane or possibly prebane (terbutryn) which cost the farm more than a brand new small family car in the early 80's
By then I was on a large arable farm in N Herts which had no animals, the rotation was 5 cereals and then rape or beans, we rotationally ploughed, direct drilled everything else and had no trouble whatsoever with blackgrass.
We burnt every inch we were allowed to burn (the stupid 25 acre rule came in which meant that some bigger fields had strips of grass where there had been sub-dividing firebreaks)
Meanwhile down here in Sunny Essex where I now farm, IPU resistant blackgrass had been discovered in the next-door village where two large farms grew wheat after wheat, then it all went pear-shaped.
Those farms are still struggling with the weed as am I as I took over some of one of thems land, rotation is helping us all out but stacking chems is not my pigeon.
I have ploughed out a couple of small fields on my original farm from permanent pasture to help with worm burdens in the sheep and cattle.
They don't need quite such a large chemical input to control blackgrass as there isn't any and we are careful not to add any either.
Hindsight
Member
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Before the substituted urea herbicides isoproturon and chlortoluron there was contact herbicide Barban - sold as Carbyne B25 manufactured if I recall by Fisons. Tried to find a reference on the web but cannot. Might look in the old filing cabinets to see if I can find a 1970's ADAS reference pamphlet I had.
solo
Member
- Location
- worcestershire
Blackgrass appeared on some land my father bought in 1979. It had been in grass for 30ish years and it was ploughed power harrowed and drilled for 2 wheats and then scratch tillage with a flexitime after that. Stubble burning made min till possible with an accord on Suffolk coulters. IPU was the backbone of the spray program partnered with treflan, tolugan, hoegrass, etc. Autumn kite and cheetah were also tried too. Resistance was shown in tests by late1980's hence cheetah not working well. Blackgrass has been more of an issue in the last decade with the loss of chemicals and poor autumn drilling conditions. The rest of the farm remained clean until about 5 years ago where odd plants have crept in. The only solution for us was 5 year grass leys with no tolerance of seed return. Fortunately the affected area is only 8% of the farmed area. My farm management now focuses on manual elimination and machinery clean down on the main farmed area. The affected land is now resown with grass.
Very interesting to see that some of you use 4yr leys or longer to help in the control of your blackgrass problem,it would be interesting to know the different ways you are utilising your grass leys .Do you have your own sheep or cattle,or do you rent the grass out to young farmers etc that are trying to get a foot in to farming by renting grass leys etc,for their sheep or cattle.
Perhaps I should start a separate thread "How are you utilising your 2/3/4/5 yr leys".If one has not had livestock on your farm before it must be a major capital investment to start a sheep flock,suckler herd etc, then there is the small problem of who looks after the newly introduced livestock,as few tractor drivers are interested in livestock, and of course the cost of fencing arable fields can be very expensive. The last question which perhaps I should of put first ,"How do I get grass leys to make a profit",it must be very difficult.
Perhaps I should start a separate thread "How are you utilising your 2/3/4/5 yr leys".If one has not had livestock on your farm before it must be a major capital investment to start a sheep flock,suckler herd etc, then there is the small problem of who looks after the newly introduced livestock,as few tractor drivers are interested in livestock, and of course the cost of fencing arable fields can be very expensive. The last question which perhaps I should of put first ,"How do I get grass leys to make a profit",it must be very difficult.
yellow belly
Member
- Location
- south west lincolnshire
Used to use dicurane for wild oats when it first came out which also kept the bg at bay
Neibours land had hitane and hoegrass in the 1980s we by 1990 it had resistance showing up he then ploughed straw in
We bought the land and used avadex as it had wild oats
We grew linseed and fusillade failed
This same block had had crystal in the 0ties
Now on notill and grow spring crops in the rotation which is reducing black grass year on year
One field in this block had bg or wild oats but not in the same parts of the field
Neibours land had hitane and hoegrass in the 1980s we by 1990 it had resistance showing up he then ploughed straw in
We bought the land and used avadex as it had wild oats
We grew linseed and fusillade failed
This same block had had crystal in the 0ties
Now on notill and grow spring crops in the rotation which is reducing black grass year on year
One field in this block had bg or wild oats but not in the same parts of the field
Colin
Member
- Location
- Perthshire
AHH but do you calibrate it quarterly [emoji23]
- Location
- northumberland
mid 80's when I started, we used to plough everything apart from when we first started growing OSR which would be put in mintill after burning stubble, IPU was 1 of the main chemicals in the tank, but after burning and IPU got band the BG has started to creep in, must've started off coming in the seed from the south 
