Ready with Your Weed Prevention Program?

Many weed problems can be prevented or avoided. Like other Best Management Practices (BMPs), they should be written down and shared with others who are on your farm. Take a rainy day write down your weed prevention strategies:

Here are some suggestions:

• Prevent perennial weeds from moving into your fields. Work infested areas last, and clean equipment before moving to new fields. Watch for quackgrass rhizomes, nutlets of yellow nutsedge, and fleshy roots of Canada thistle and milkweed.
  
• Include weed scouting in your IPM program. Create field maps showing weed patches. Note areas of concern, and compare with last year's maps to note changes in weedy patches.
  
• Identify unknown weeds. Prepare a sampling kit to preserve collected samples. Collect 3 or 4 whole plant samples, including flowers and root structures. Put them in a paper bag, label it with name, date and location, and place this inside a plastic bag. Samples can be stored in a cooler or fridge for several days.
  
• Scout for weeds along the edges of fields, in fencerows and ditch banks. Note "new" or invading weeds and destroy them before seeding.
  
• Reduce weed seeds by mowing or by selectively treating weed escapes before they flower.
  
• Plan to clean up fields to be planted next year by spot treating any perennials at the proper time.
  
• Where straw mulch is used, ensure that no weeds are piggy-backing into your fields. Spring hormone herbicides and proper bale storage is important to produce clean straw.
  
• Where plastic mulch or landscape fabric is used, plan regular weed control along the plastic/fabric edges.

What's been your most successful strategy for weeds? Let me know your best strategy to prevent or reduce weeds and we'll build this list to share with others.

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