He tells them two things:

1. Don’t hold your breath.
2. You’ll need to work with what you have.

“Do not expect any quick help on that front with wild oats,” said Micklich, precision ag specialist and owner of Progrow Agriculture in Vegreville, Alta., in a presentation at Agronomy Update 2026.

“It is an extremely complicated plant.

“It’s actually hexaploid, so it has six different sets of chromosomes. What that means is it’s extremely unpredictable on … how each chemical interacts with each other in the target sites. So it’s just an extremely hard plant to map out,” he added.

WHY IT MATTERS: Wild oat is a tough weed to control, with no one herbicide capable of tackling the Prairie pest.

But don’t despair. Cultural control practices — such as increasing seeding rates and adding an early-maturing crop to rotation — can go a long way towards removing these pesky oats from your field, he said.

“There is no shortage of options to be used in the fight against wild oats.”

However, producers may need to reconsider any “This is what I’ve always done” attitudes they may be harbouring, advised Micklich.

“We need to move to ‘What do I need to do?’ and ‘How can I manage this?’ We need to be more long-term focused.”

Maury Micklich
Progrow Agriculture

Herbicide-resistant wild oat (HRWO) is of “special concern” according to Alberta Grains. And for good reason: According to the most recent herbicide resistance survey, resistance is building and building fast.

The survey results reveal that 69 per cent of Alberta fields sampled for resistance in wild oat contain HRWOs.

Of that percentage, 62 per cent of fields are resistant to Group 1 herbicides, 34 per cent to Group 2 herbicides and 27 per cent are resistant to both.

Those numbers are growing. The producer organization points to “drastic increases” in HWRO in Alberta since a Western Canada-wide survey in 2000.

Make the switch to TKW

There are several tasks producers should perform prior, during and after the crop season when dealing with HRWO. Micklich pointed to examples such as scouting for post-spray efficacy, identifying cross-resistance, seed sampling and reaching out to dealers for resistance testing if necessary.

One of the most important things producers can do to fight HRWO is increase seeding rates. However, some may have to make an adjustment in how they measure seed.

For producers who haven’t made the switch from bushels or pounds per acre to 1,000 kernel weight (TKW, sometimes known as total seed weight or TSW), or the weight of 1,000 seeds, this is the time to do so.

In 2019, Harry Brook, agrologist with Alberta Agriculture, told Alberta Farmer Express why TKW is a more precise gauge of seed size measurement.

“Where there is significant variation in seed size between one variety and another, bushels per acre is a poor seeding tool to use,” he said.

“With peas, for example, there can be as much as 75 per cent seed size variation. That can have a big impact on plants per square foot.”

Adds Micklich, “When you’re just doing a two bushel an acre measurement, that’s a volumetric measurement. It’s just not that accurate anymore.”

“What we want to do is use 1,000 kernel weight and calculate it off of what your target plant per square foot is, because if you just use bushels off of seed weight, your rate will sway. It can sway up to 20, 30 per cent just based off of seed weight if you’re just doing 120 pounds an acre and that’s it.”

Add early maturing crops to rotation

Adding early maturing crops such as peas and winter wheat to a rotation is likely the most important tool growers can use prevent reoccurring wild oat growth, said Micklich. The idea is to kick wild oats out of the seed bank before they’re physically mature, decreasing their survivability drastically.

“So if we can knock it off the plant in mid-August where it’s not quite mature … you reduce the survivability of that seed over winter.”

Taking preventative measures against wild oat early — particularly with late-harvested crops like wheat and canola — makes sense because there aren’t many control options once the oats establish.

“That (wild oat) seed will reach maturity before we get to it and (the seeds) will drop. So you’re just replenishing that seed bank. I wouldn’t say you’re starting from square one, but you’re just not eliminating that seed,” noted Miklich.

“A lot of times in east-central Alberta, by the time we harvest canola, it’s getting close to freezing. Most guys aren’t going to be doing a post-harvest spray. So you just get yourself in a weird spot where there’s nothing you can do to try and reduce that seed bank until the spring.”

Herbicide layering now a must-do

With so much herbicide resistance already a part of wild oats, producers don’t have much choice but to layer herbicides to control the weed, said Miklich.

“This is mandatory — you’re just getting ahead of it by initiating this.

“The concept of it is we’re trying to use different groups or modes of action sequentially throughout the growing season.

“The basis of it is you do a fall apply in say Group 15; a pre-burn, say, in a Group 2 or Group 15, and then an in-crop, say, in a Group 1 … whatever group you would have the most efficacy with.”

Minimize tillage

There are several reasons to minimize tillage, but in the case of wild oat a big one is preventing the incorporation of wild oat seed underground where it can remain dormant for years, in the process increasing their life spans.

“When guys are high-speed disking their wild oat patches — that is one of the worst things we can do for it because you are burying that seed and it will sit in dormancy.”

What growers need to do, offered Micklich, is induce germination of the wild oat.

“So say, in a pea crop; if you’ve had that stubble sitting for a month in the sun, a lot of those wild oats will be germinated. Either the frost will get it or it will give us a point of attack to eliminate those seeds: A germinated seed that you can kill or do something with is one less seed in that seed bank.”

The post Think beyond the herbicide jug when dealing with wild oats appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Aaron Hager, a University of Illinois weed scientist, reported last month that Illinois had several locations where waterhemp had developed resistance to glufosinate, a commonly used herbicide in North America.

Other states in the Midwest have the same problem.

“Four states in the U.S. (including Illinois) are all going to come out (soon) with glufosinate-resistant waterhemp,” said Joe Ikley, a weed scientist at North Dakota State University.

Ikley made the comment Jan. 7 at St. Jean Farm Days, a farm show in Manitoba’s Red River Valley.

The news from the U.S. Midwest is concerning because farmers are running out of options to control waterhemp, a member of the pigweed family. It has already developed resistance to seven different modes of action.

For farmers on the northern Great Plains, it’s a matter of time before waterhemp with resistance to glufosinate is confirmed, Ikley said.

“If it can evolve resistant to a herbicide in Illinois, there’s no reason it can’t do it in North Dakota or the Canadian Prairies.”

Kochia next?

Waterhemp was first discovered in Manitoba in 2017, and it’s now present in a wide geography within the province.

It hasn’t been confirmed in Saskatchewan, but weed experts are asking farmers and agronomists to maintain a close watch for the troublesome weed.

While waterhemp is an extremely difficult weed, a bigger risk to western Canadian farmers would be glufosinate-resistant kochia.

In North Dakota, farmers apply glufosinate to 10-million acres of land every year, Ikley said.

So, kochia plants are receiving repeated doses of glufosinate, and resistance is on the horizon.

More North Dakota farmers are reporting escapes, where the herbicide fails to kill a kochia plant. If glufosinate is applied to 100 kochia plants in field and 95 die, the remaining five plants are “escapes.”

“We see escapes almost every year. Can we prove those ones to be resistant, yet? It’s just a matter of time … until we get a population that is indeed resistant.”

Joe Ikley, weed scientist
North Dakota State University

It’s impossible to predict when glufosinate-resistant kochia will arrive in North Dakota or the Prairies.

But Ikley is particularly worried about canola growers, who rely on glufosinate to keep weeds in check.

InVigor hybrids dominate the canola acres in Western Canada, which are genetically modified to have tolerance to glufosinate.

“The issue, when I look at kochia and canola right now, is that the options are glyphosate or glufosinate,” Ikley said.

“And we (already) have widespread glyphosate resistance (in kochia).”

At St. Jean Farm Days, an agronomist delivered a blunt assessment of the risk.

If glufosinate-resistant kochia appears on the Prairies, farmers are “hooped.”

The post Glufosinate resistant waterhemp found in U.S. Midwest appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

The meetings, called Agronomy Battles, will allow producers, scientists and agronomists to meet face to face to work through the challenges faced by farmers in specific regions of southern Alberta:

• Cover crops for soil conservation and erosion, Nov. 19 in Bow Island.

• Strip tillage, Nov. 26 in Taber.

• Herbicide resistance: kochia and wild oats (Dec. 3 in Enchant).

Why It Matters: Non-profit southern Alberta organization hopes to get grassroots feedback from Agronomy Battles series to guide research to aid Canadian farmers

The introductory cover crops session will explore how farmers and researchers have navigated obstacles such as equipment and establishment to reap the benefits of cover crops. The round table discussion will highlight the benefits of cover crops and as farmers to talk about what has slowed or stopped their adoption.

“Rather than having everybody come to us, we did want to go out to them, mainly because these problems are so localized. Every field is different. How you’re going to approach a problem is different farmer to farmer and field to field,” said Sean Kjos, communications co-ordinator with Farming Smarter, a non-profit research institute.

“The location for each is picked based on the work we’ve done. We’ve been doing a lot of herbicide stuff out by Enchant. A bunch of our strip tillage locations are around Taber and so we’re doing the Taber hall for that conversation.”

The series grew out of research meetings held earlier this year as well as Living Labs project funding applications in 202. They are seen as a chance to put various stakeholders in the same room to bounce ideas and methods off each other in a grassroots format.

“They’ve all seen things in their particular fields. This is our way of bringing them all together and letting them share all this information, not only with us, but with each other in a more intimate setting. So, you have to learn the name of the person at the table,” said Kjos.

“We hope to hear the innovative ideas that are coming from the farmers in these areas because it helps us drive relevant research. If there’s something that they think can work, but they haven’t had the access to tools or equipment or even just cursory area knowledge around the subject, we can help them out. Our biggest goal is expanding the number of community members that we get involved with. If farmers come by and they want to trial something, even if it’s kind of like lukewarm in the room, if they’re adamant, we’d love to help them out. We’d love to help them find an answer either way.”

Kjos said the capacity for each session is approximately 30 producers with availability still open in each one. They will run from 1-3 p.m.

For more information, contact Kjos at sean.kjos@farmingsmarter.com or 403-363-2299 or Jamie Puchinger at jamie@farmingsmarter.com or 403-308-9344.

The post Farming Smarter to hold Agronomy Battles series appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

The rapid and relentless spread of kochia, the highly adaptable and increasingly resistant weed, is moving north and taking root in places scientists thought it never would.

Breanna Tidemann, research scientist with Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, gave a presentation to local farmers in Wainwright, Alberta, in June. She explained that kochia, which has long been known as a southern Alberta problem, has started moving its way to the central and northern parts of the province.

“We’re seeing kochia move further north than ever before. Random field surveys now show kochia populations extending all the way to the outskirts of Edmonton, which is a dramatic shift from its historical range,” Tidemann said.

Besides its unexpected spread northward, the biggest concern with kochia is its rapid development of herbicide resistance.

Tidemann said in just the past decade, the percentage of glyphosate-resistant kochia population in Alberta has skyrocketed from five per cent to nearly 80 per cent. The weed has not only developed a resistance to multiple herbicide groups, but it has also demonstrated an ability to spread resistance through pollen, making traditional control methods increasingly ineffective.

“We’re essentially running out of chemical solutions,” Tidemann said.

“Kochia has developed resistance to group two, glyphosate, dicamba and now potentially group 14 herbicides. This means farmers are facing a weed that can survive most standard chemical treatments.”

Impacts of kochia’s spread

The kochia invasion in central and northern Alberta represents more than just an agricultural change. It threatens crop yields, increases production costs and could potentially fundamentally alter farming practices across Alberta.

“This isn’t just about controlling a weed. It’s about adapting our entire agricultural approach to a changing environmental landscape,” Tidemann said.

Further herbicide resistance surveys taking place over the next couple years will provide further insights into the weed’s spread and resistance patterns.

Steps to managing kochia

Tidemann said managing the spread of kochia will be a multi-pronged approach for farmers in Alberta.

Early detection is key. Farmers should scout fields early and try to identify kochia before it establishes.

Crop diversity and seeding strategies are also important. Implementing varied crop rotations with a special emphasis on competitive crops like canola and winter wheat and using higher seeding rates with narrower row spacing can help increase crop competition.

She added that thoroughly cleaning equipment between fields and using impact mills during harvest to reduce seed spread can help control the population.

Tidemann also emphasized the importance of using certified seeds other than minimize weed contamination.

The post Kochia spreading unexpectedly in Alberta appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Weeds are growing resistant to the herbicides already on the market, and agribusiness companies like Bayer are in a desperate search for new modes of action to help farmers kill them.

Bayer’s Icafolin product will be its first new mode of action herbicide in some 30 years when it launches in Brazil in 2028.

Frank Terhorst, executive vice president of strategy and sustainability at Bayer’s Crop Science Division, told Reuters on Monday that AI could help speed up finding that next new mode of action.

“You want to find the one where you have maximum performance on what you want to kill – weeds, and basically no impact on everything else. And that balance is extremely difficult,” Terhorst told Reuters after an event in Chicago.

AI, he said, helps the company match the protein structure of a weed with a molecule that targets that structure, and enables it to use huge amounts of data.

It is a faster process, he said, and there are fewer dropouts.

Bob Reiter, head of research and development, crop science, at Bayer, said in a statement that with AI tools, the timeline for the discovery of the next new mode of action could be much shorter.

“If we take the example of early research only, we today have at least three times the number of new modes of action compared to ten years ago,” he said.

The post Bayer looks to AI to combat herbicide resistance faster appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

That isn’t a lot, as the country has some 50,000 grain farms that buy about 2,000 new combines every year.

But adoption of the destructors, which pulverize weed seeds before they exit the combine, is slowly gaining momentum.

“The first mills that we’re aware of (in Canada) were adopted on farm in 2018. To go from none in 2017 to 30 in 2023, to me that shows (some) producers are seeing a benefit from it,” said Breanne Tidemann, an Agriculture Canada weed scientist in Alberta.

“A lot of the mills that I’m aware of came on board from 2022 and later.”

Weed seed destructors are popular with Australian farmers. In 2022 more than 1,100 new combines were sold in Australia, according to the Tractor and Machinery Association of Australia. Of those new combines, 25 to 30 per cent were equipped with weed seed destructors.

Many Australian farmers were essentially forced to adopt the technology because of herbicide-resistant weeds.

Using a combine equipped with a destructor can reduce the number of viable weed seeds in the chaff, thus lowering the number that can germinate in the following year.

The adoption rate is much lower in Canada, but worries about herbicide-resistant weeds and the cost of controlling them has convinced a few farmers.

“Most of our (Canadian) sales are coming from the Alberta-Saskatchewan border area, where the kochia problem is really bad and getting worse,” said Trevor Thiessen, president of Redekop Manufacturing.

Redekop, located in Saskatoon, is one of several companies that manufacture weed seed destructors. The units can be retro-fitted onto used combines or installed on new machines, but they cost about $100,000, which has slowed adoption.

Another factor is evidence. More research is needed to demonstrate the agronomic benefits of the technology.

“The longest term studies that we’ve done are three years, which are a little on the short side,” Tidemann said.

To gather more information on potential benefits, she surveyed about 10 Canadian farmers who collectively use 18 mills. Some producers see a decline in weed populations and herbicide costs.

“I had three (farmers) that felt they had seen reductions in their weed densities since adopting the mill. On average, about a 60 per cent reduction in weed densities was their estimate,” Tidemann said. “Two have been able to reduce herbicide applications by 25 and 30 per cent.”

Those farmers have used the mills for several years; one since 2018 and the other two since 2020.

Most of the farmers in Tidemann’s survey started using destructors in 2022. It’s difficult to notice the benefits of a new practice after only a year or two.

In the U.S., a small number of farmers are experimenting with weed seed destructors. Adoption rates are low, even though herbicide resistance is a widespread problem.

“They’re also sitting at 25-30 mills primarily in Washington (State),” Tidemann said. “They’re really not far ahead of us.”

However, American research shows encouraging results. Scientists from Virginia Tech have tested the Redekop Seed Control Unit on soybeans and wheat. They found weed seed kill rates ranging from 93 to 99 percent in wheat chaff and over 98.5 per cent in soybean chaff.

The researchers determined that of all the weed seeds entering the combine, less than five percent returns to the field.

– Robert Arnason is a reporter with The Western Producer.

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In many cases weeds are developing resistance against multiple herbicides, scientists said.

Reuters interviewed two dozen farmers, scientists, weed specialists and company executives and reviewed eight academic papers published since 2021 which described how kochia, waterhemp, giant ragweed and other weeds are squeezing out crops in North Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Minnesota as chemicals lose their effectiveness.

Over the last two decades, chemical companies have reduced the share of revenue devoted to research and development spending and are introducing fewer products, according to AgbioInvestor, a UK-based firm that analyzes the crop protection sector.

Farmers say their losing battle with weeds threatens grain and oilseed harvests at a time when growers are grappling with inflation and extreme weather linked to climate change.

“We’re in for big problems over the next 10 years for sure,” said Ian Heap, director of the International Survey of Herbicide Resistant Weeds, a group of scientists in over 80 countries that maintains a global database. “We are in for a real shake-up.”

The database records reduced effectiveness for glyphosate, one of the most common herbicides, against 361 weed species, including 180 in the U.S., affecting corn, soy, sugar beets and other crops.

Some 21 weed species globally showed resistance to dicamba, the most recent major U.S. chemical, which launched in 2017.

Environmental groups argue that farmers should embrace natural weed-control methods instead of chemicals.

Kochia, which spreads as many as 30,000 seeds per plant, can cut yields by up to 70 per cent if left unchecked, according to Take Action, a farmer resource program of the United Soybean Board.

Other factors, including the development of more robust seeds, have pushed overall global crop yields higher. But scientists expect weed problems to worsen, with some weeds showing resistance to chemicals even on first exposure.

‘Really scary’

In Douglas, North Dakota, farmer Bob Finken sprayed dicamba and glyphosate to kill late-season weeds. Neither product eliminated kochia.

“That was really scary,” said Finken, 64. “Each year seems to get a little worse.”

Finken was forced to clear the weeds with harvesting equipment, which risks clogging expensive machinery.

Other farmers are hiring workers to pull weeds by hand, said Sarah Lovas, an agronomist with GK Technology, a precision agriculture firm.

North Dakota was the largest spring wheat producing state in 2023 and ninth-biggest soybean grower.

Five of North Dakota’s 53 counties have confirmed populations of dicamba-resistant kochia, a year after it was first reported in the state, North Dakota State University weed specialist Joe Ikley said.

“It’s just a matter of time before it hits your farm,” said Monte Peterson, 65, who grows soybeans near Valley City, North Dakota.

Lab scale-back

Chemical producers Bayer, Corteva and FMC FMC.N say longer development and regulatory processes have constrained new products to combat weed resistance. Industry executives say regulators have become more stringent about environmental and health impacts.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) said standards for approving new herbicides have not substantially changed since 1996. However, the EPA said recent efforts to assess the impact of new active ingredients on threatened plants and wildlife have delayed some decisions.

The EPA did not estimate the increased processing time. The agency said it expedites reviews of lower-risk products.

Farm chemical companies spent 6.2 per cent of sales revenue on development of new active ingredients in 2020, down from 8.9 per cent in 2000, AgbioInvestor said. Its data showed the introduction of new active ingredients fell by more than half in 2022 from 2000.

Instead, companies have expanded uses of existing products like dicamba, glufosinate and 2,4-D.

FMC plans the 2026 launch of an herbicide to kill grassy weeds in rice crops based on the industry’s first new mode of action, a term for the way a chemical kills a weed, in three decades.

The herbicide was in development for 11 years. FMC hopes it will generate $400 million in sales within a decade, a fraction of the roughly $8 billion global glyphosate market.

“If we don’t keep developing the new products, we are going to run into a wall where growers don’t have the tools to combat the pests,” CEO Mark Douglas said. “And then ultimately you face food security issues.”

The world’s biggest agriculture chemical and seed company, Germany’s Bayer, hopes to produce its first new mode of action herbicide in over 30 years by 2028.

“We’re really desperate for (new modes of action) if we’re going to sustain uses for farmers,” said Bob Reiter, head of research and development for Bayer’s crop science division.

Two decades ago, companies commercialized a product for every 50,000 candidates, but it now takes 100,000 to 150,000 attempts, Reiter said.

U.S.-based Corteva said it has incorporated sustainability criteria, such as reduced groundwater risk, in its research and development, aiming to clear the path with regulators.

It hopes that approach will shorten the regulatory process when it introduces a fungicide with a new mode of action against Asian soybean rust disease in Brazil around 2027, said Ramnath Subramanian, vice-president of crop protection research and development. He did not say how much shorter the process may be.

Bill Freese, scientific director of the Center for Food Safety in Washington, said farmers should shift away from crops genetically engineered to tolerate herbicides, which lead to plants becoming resistant to multiple chemicals through repeated sprayings.

“It’s like this toxic spiral,” Freese said. “There’s no end in sight.”

–Reporting for Reuters by Rod Nickel in Winnipeg, Manitoba and Tom Polansek in Chicago.

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Writing Monday in the ag ministry’s Field Crop News, Ontario provincial weed management specialist Mike Cowbrough said the plant in question, found in Wellington County, is confirmed as palmer amaranth.

The species has previously been dubbed the most troublesome weed in U.S. agriculture, but hasn’t yet appeared in Canada in a significant way; its only other recent known appearance in Canada outside Ontario was by a couple of plants in a southern Manitoba bean field in 2021.

While the broadleaf weed is known for its physical height — up to eight feet — and aggressive rate of spread, it’s also infamous in the U.S. and elsewhere for its adaptability against herbicides, making it even more difficult to keep in check.

The International Herbicide-Resistant Weed Database has logged cases in multiple countries of palmer amaranth plants showing resistance to one, two or three herbicide modes of action, along with two cases in the U.S. — Kansas in 2015 and Arkansas in 2016 — where the plants were resistant to five modes.

The database also documents one case, in a Kansas sorghum field in 2021, in which a palmer amaranth plant showed resistance to six different herbicide modes of action (groups 2, 5, 6, 9, 14 and 27).

In all, populations of palmer amaranth have been found with resistance to one or more of nine different modes.

Cowbrough, in his post Monday, said “it was only a matter of time” before the weed turned up in Ontario, as it was already in the Ontario-adjacent states of New York and Michigan — and has been seen in all other states bordering the Great Lakes.

Provincial specialists had also previously confirmed one-off appearances in separate spots in Ontario in 1966, 1978 and, most recently, in 2007 near Niagara Falls.

“The most valuable thing that can be done at this point is to know the process to identify any plants you suspect may be palmer amaranth and destroy any plants before they produce seed,” Cowbrough wrote.

But proper identification may be a tall order; Ontario weed specialists have previously noted it’s extremely difficult to discern palmer amaranth — or its relative, waterhemp, for that matter — from other pigweed species, especially when spotted as seedlings.

For example: the Wellington County landowner who called in the newest case described it as “‘a weird looking pigweed’ that just looked different than anything they had seen before,” Cowbrough said.

However, he said, that goes to show farmers’ gut instinct is “usually a pretty good screening tool for when you should seek help” confirming either palmer amaranth or waterhemp.

Early detection, particularly when the number of plants involved is small and manageable, is important, he said. Any palmer amaranth plants could be pulled or dug out, roots included, to prevent any seed from being produced and/or dispersed.

To help prevent the weed from gaining a toehold, Cowbrough said fall-seeded crops such as winter cereals and winter canola can “create an environment that is not ideal for (weed) seed germination.” Cover crops planted after a crop harvest are also known to generally help reduce pigweed populations that germinate and can produce viable seed.

Perennial forages such as alfalfa, he said, offer “the best opportunity” to prevent seedlings from germinating — and to draw down the weed population’s seed bank through “predation and other environmental stressors.”

For fields that are going into corn and/or soybean, finding an effective pre-emergence herbicide is “extremely important,” he said, as it would take out a “significant amount” of a first flush of palmer amaranth seedlings and make sure there’s not a “huge range” in weed stage for any post-emergent spraying that follows. — Glacier FarmMedia Network

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At the Ag in Motion outdoor farm show this week, field residue management manufacturer Redekop won the Innovations Award for Environmental Sustainability for its harvest Seed Control Unit, which destroys more than 95 per cent of unwanted seeds the combine leaves behind.

With different weeds and weed varieties becoming increasingly resistant to glyphosate herbicides, integrated weed management will be vital for western Canadian farmers in the near future.

Redekop field support and salesperson Neale Heinrich was at the Discovery Farm for this year’s Ag in Motion event, coming from Australia. The battle with herbicide-resistant weeds Down Under has spanned decades, particularly against Italian ryegrass.

“We’re close to 40 years of resistance, building and building,” said Heinrich.

“It’s been a battle. All sorts of different processors, chaff carts, burning, all sorts of stuff.”

There are many different ways to control weed seeds at harvest, such as chaff-collecting, chaff-trampling, chaff-lining, baling behind the combine and burning the straw.

Some methods remove the chaff, and in turn remove most of the seeds with it. Chaff-trampling and chaff-lining concentrate the chaff into lines, which create rot and make it difficult for the weeds to grow while reducing their spread.

The Redekop Seed Control Unit destroys the seeds that leave the combine through the chaff and spreads a refined dust across the field, removing the seed problem without removing the straw.

Managing the chaff is key to eliminating herbicide-resistant weeds because they are typically spread through the combine’s straw chopper, broadcasting the seeds across the field.

Breanne Tidemann, a research scientist at Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, wants to find ways to limit how many weed seeds remain in the field after harvest, and in turn limit weed growth and reproduction.

“When we’re applying herbicides, we’re trying to stop those seedling stages,” she said.

“we’re focusing on that part of the life-cycle — let’s kill those seedlings. But those seedlings we don’t manage to kill, those that return, the ones that produce the seeds that we’re broadcasting, those that are a problem in the current system, they’re probably the most herbicide-resistant.

“They’re the ones that have avoided every other thing that we’ve thrown at them so far, and they’re going to come back and grow again next year. We’re making our lives harder by putting those back into our soil.”

Tidemann specializes in integrated weed management, weed biology, harvest weed-seed control and managing herbicide-resistant weeds. She spoke at Ag in Motion Tuesday on herbicide-resistant weeds in Western Canada and how to manage them.

Wild oats, kochia, cleavers and green and yellow foxtail are some of the many weeds becoming resistant to herbicides across the Prairies.

Tidemann’s research shows that 74 per cent of any weed that is put through the harvester will be herbicide-resistant, and so will their seeds.

“Three out of four fields that have weeds in them around harvest time probably have resistant weeds,” said Tidemann.

The number is also increasingly rapidly. Her studies show that kochia in Alberta was first observed as being glyphosate-resistant in 2011, and in 2012 five per cent of populations were resistant.

In the most recent 2021 survey, 78 per cent of kochia in Alberta is resistant. The resistance is growing in population and in strength, making more herbicides useless against them.

For Heinrich, this sounded all too familiar.

“Listening to Breanne (Tidemann), you want to get on it,” he said.

“If you can learn anything from Australia’s perspective, we’re fighting, we’re fighting back and working our hardest to try to get ahead of it, but it’s been ahead of us.”

Taking the seeds out of the field helps Australian farmers regain control of their farmland, although Heinrich said it took them a long time for the seed banks to empty.

Newcomers to integrated seed management can’t expect weeds to leave the field instantly, although they can expect to see their weeds stay more concentrated rather than spread across the field.

“It’s a long-term (plan),” said Heinrich. “We do have clients that have said they’ve taken on a piece of property and it was filthy with weeds when they took it, then the following year they came back to harvest and they’ve seen a marked difference.”

While integrated weed management has been widely adopted in Australia, it has not gained a lot of traction in Western Canada. Tidemann said only 20 to 30 Redekop Seed Control Units are being used across the Prairies.

The post At Ag in Motion: Herbicide resistance fight needs integrated seed management appeared first on Alberta Farmer Express.

Harvest weed seed control might not be a golden bullet to tackle glyphosate-, fluroxypyr- and dicamba-resistant weeds, but according to Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada researcher Breanne Tidemann, it’s part of the range of solutions needed to stem the tide.

“You’re not going to spray your way out of this,” Tidemann said about herbicide resistance during her presentation at Ag in Motion.

“If you get a new product or new mode of action that works really well, everyone is going to adopt it, the selection pressure is going to go through the roof and we’re going to break that next tool, too. So, continuing to hope, cross our fingers, wishing and praying a new product is going to come out and save us is a little bit naïve, a little wishful thinking.”

However, the ability to mechanically separate weed seed at the point of harvest is part of the diversification solution that looks beyond just chemicals.

Development of harvest weed seed control started in the early 2000s in Australia before moving onto commercialization with the Harrington Seed Destructor trailer unit.

There are limitations to the implement, mainly that the weeds need to be either tall or short enough to fit in the header. However, once they do, the weed seeds are largely ground up into a flour-like material, doesn’t broadcast and can be an effective tool in not only limiting spread but getting to the core of the issue. As long as weeds are harvested, seed destructors have a more than 95 per cent rate of success.

Canadian research with the unit began in 2014, but since then, integrated harvest weed seed control implements for combines have been developed and are now commercially available.

While initial research is promising in demonstrating the implement will have significant impact on both weed control as well as limiting broadcast, weeds will likely be able to adapt even to mechanical attempts at tackling weeds.

“Weeds will adapt. Weeds are dirty little buggers that will find some way — they’ll mature more quickly, they’ll drop there seeds earlier, they’ll become more prostrate,” said Tidemann.

“We’ll see adaptations, I firmly believe that, particularly if we switch whole hog from only herbicides to only relying on this.”

She said it’s about redundancy, adding the solution is to use a range of techniques.

As far as where the technology goes next, Tidemann said the speed in which it’s already progressed is impressive and manufacturers of weed seed harvest control implements are continually improving the product.

“They are really listening to farmers,” she said.

“A farmer will say, ‘I had a problem with a metal bolt going through and it damaged my mill, I had to do a lot of repairs.’ The next thing you know, they’ve got a magnetic strip to catch metal pieces before they go through the mills.”

As development work continues, Tidemann said she hopes the technology is more widely adopted in Canada.

“My understanding from talking to colleagues (in Australia) is 80 to 90 per cent of their farmers are using some form of harvest weed control,” she said.

“Western Australia is showing it can be incorporated into a system and it can help and it can work.”

There is a cost, with units running in the $100,000 range, but Tidemann said it’s likely less than what farmers might think because it can be used on one combine that can tackle particularly weed patches rather than being required on every combine.

— Alex McCuaig reports for the Western Producer from Medicine Hat.

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