Tour Goes On

On May 7, Don Morishita Ph.D., U of I Professor of Weed Science and Extension Specialist, came out and saved the beet crop trials. Temps dropped and the sprinklers had to come on to prevent the beets from freezing. Thanks Don.


That leads us to the fact that the weed tour in Kimberly had to be delayed a week. Noting the inconsistent sizes of the plants with some having around 10-leaves and others with four-to-six and a yellowish look, an obvious result of variable spring weather.
Nonetheless, the weed tour commenced and those lucky enough to attend were in for an interesting tour.


In addition to the expected sugarbeet trials, a study was conducted on comparing Roundup Ready sugarbeet to non-transgenic sugarbeet for weed control and yield. Betaseed was the participating seed for this comparison.


Also new this year was a study on direct seeded beets or otherwise called no-till planting.


The growing use of strip-tillage for planting beets is becoming more popular. They are finding that in more windy areas with sandy soil the more debris left on top protects the seedlings from wind as well as insulating the plants from the unusual cold temps.


Studies on the effects of strip-tillage on irrigation requirement, weed emergence and growth, insect behavior and disease incidence was compared to conventional tillage.
Studies on tank-mixes included evaluating Quadris fungicide tank mixed with Sequence and Touchdown for crop safety, disease incidence and weed control.
The use of adjuvants with glyphosate for wee

d control and crop tolerance in beets was also a fairly new study. Many of the adjuvant products used in this years trials included Adigor, a adjuvant naptha depleted (petroleum solvent), a water conditioning agent called Alliance, ammonium sulfate products, crop oil concentrate, a methylated soybean oil product called Destiny HC and several nonionic surfactants.


For a complete list of the adjuvants used in the studies please contact Don Morishita at the Kimberly R & E Center at 208-736-3616 or email at don@uidaho.edu.