News

Herbicide issues plaguing some farmers

An agronomist with Beck’s Hybrids says many farmers have experienced herbicide issues this year.

Chad Kalaher, who covers northeastern Illinois, tells Brownfield…

“We’ve been dealing with more tank contamination issues on the post herbicide side where we might have herbicides at unknown levels in a tank that we just didn’t know was there, maybe in a line or something like that,” he says.

He says another factor is more soybeans are being planted ahead of corn.

“There’s different platforms out there in corn that don’t have the ability to have Liberty herbicide sprayed post emerge.”  He says “That can create some problems because we have a lot of acres of soybeans now that are tolerant to both Liberty and Roundup.”

He says applicators need to prevent avoidable mistakes.

“It’s not going to go away anytime soon.”  He says, “People need to just try to be vigilant to reading and paying attention to what those herbicide tolerances are, and just lean on your resources, lean on the people you trust.”

Kalaher also says growers should completely clean equipment before moving from crop to crop. 

AUDIO: Chad Kalaher – Beck’s agronomist