Suggested New Black grass control methods for research.

[Dave645]

For any chemical company's reading.
I think there are some gaps in the market.
New ideas for chemical control of Black grass. We never hit 100% kill rates so these will always be useful.

Spray to,
1. Trigger 100% germination or better still make BG grow in the ear.
2. Just make it sterile. We may have missed the boat for Killing the plant
But can we make the BG seed sterile while still on the growing plant.
So no seed return burden.
3. A shortener that stunts its growth. Not my first choice but something is better than nothing. Anything that stops it putting out 30 tillers and smothering the crop.

Seed dressing to.
4. Controllable germination seed dressing, this I mention in delayed emergence thread,
Basicly a seed dressing that delays seed germination by up to 8 weeks, but germination can be triggered with a spray application. So we can drill when we want and trigger germination any time in that 8 week period in time with a spray application.(it will most likely require rain to get the seed contact with the chemical in the spray) I say spray but fert would also be another way a water soluble chemical included in any source that can trigger the break down of the seed dressing that's delaying the germination of our seed.

1-3 would be welcome in anyone's spray program. Even after we had a new chemical that gave great control of BG. We never hit 100%.....

 

[Northdowns Martin]

Creative ideas Dave, I think any thoughts outside the herbicide can are going to be a major way forward in controlling this clever plant.

 

[Gong Farmer]

3. If you stunt its growth you could encourage tillering, also I've seen black-grass head at about 15cm tall. If you just mean put it under stress, then any plant's response to stress is to reproduce, i.e. produce seed as quickly as possible.

 

[Luke Cropwalker]

A spray that could be applied to switch off any resistance. The blackgrass would then be susceptible to any herbicide at any timing. Or a new type of slug that will eat all of the other slugs and blackgrass but won't touch any type of crops.

 

[turbo]

How about working out how to stop some of the old chemical getting into water so we can have some of the old actives back,I know they have done it with ipu but not at a dose that will control bg.a lot of the old ai were banned because they turned up in water and nothing else

 

[shakerator]

I know bayer were looking at taking the safener off Atlantis and applying it to the wheat seed. Otherwise it kills the wheat and blackgrass. Trouble is this goes down the intellectual property with seed route

 

[Dave645]

A spray that could be applied to switch off any resistance. The blackgrass would then be susceptible to any herbicide at any timing. Or a new type of slug that will eat all of the other slugs and blackgrass but won't touch any type of crops.

You would think that if switching off resistance was possible they should do it, I assume your targeting the following generation, so mutate the seed in the growing plant so it's easily killed with cheap sprays the following season. If they want to maximise their return make them mutate to be very week against one of their existing chemicals for the following season.
I did consider slugs, my idea was a spray to make black grass seed super palatable to slugs, but that may just make slugs breed faster and become a bigger pest. It would have to be super effective in the early season so they only target BG.

 

[Rob Holmes]

Breed wheat with allelopathic properties to suppress/sensitivise weeds (and slugs)

 

[charlesbrown]

I know, why not genetically modify a crop to be resistant to roundup.............




I'll get my coat

 

[yellow belly]

I know, why not genetically modify a crop to be resistant to roundup.............




I'll get my coat

the most sensible solution and available outside the eu

 

[yellow belly]

Breed wheat with allelopathic properties to suppress/sensitivise weeds (and slugs)

soil association and foe would still find a reason why it should be banned

 

[woodylane]

How about instead of a spray that stunts growth you could have one that encourages it to become a lot taller than the crop? Easier to weed wipe and less tillers?