Winning the post-emergence weed battle in sugar beet

Sugar beet growers are increasingly looking at the use of pre-emergence treatments to kick-start their weed control programmes, with active ingredients such as metamitron, ethofumesate, quinmerac giving a good range of options.

Nevertheless, the expert use of post-emergence herbicides remains important in bringing the best possible levels of weed control. The actives mentioned above can also be used as post-emergence treatments along with phenmedipham and propaquizafop giving growers a range of options with which to tackle subsequent and successive flushes of weeds.

GOLTIX (700g/l metamitron)* and GOLTIX TITAN (525g/l metamitron and 40g/l quinmerac) have become increasingly important as residual herbicides since the revocation of desmedipham made post-emergence weed control more challenging, with both helping to delay the emergence of weeds until sugar beet crops (which are notoriously sensitive to many herbicides) have developed some resilience to subsequent contact treatments.

In addition to their pre-emergence roles, Goltix and Goltix Titan are also approved for use as post-emergence treatments when they’ll work most effectively when applied with an oil-based adjuvant.

Both offer good post-emergence weed control in their own right, with Goltix one of the safest and best known options for use in sugar beet. Both are also suitable for use in combination with additional active ingredients which gives growers the ability to mix and match herbicides according to their specific weed burden. For example, Goltix Titan can be used safely in combination with phenmedipham, ethofumesate, lenacil, clopyralid or triflusulfuron-methyl depending on the weeds being targeted.

Two of these active ingredients are available as POWERTWIN (200 g/L phenmedipham and 200 g/L ethofumesate) which gives a broad spectrum of control of broad leaved weeds and as such is the ideal partner to Goltix and Goltix Titan. The use of an oil-based adjuvant is clearly beneficial with SC formulations such as POWERTWIN which has a broad range of adjuvant choices on-label – for example to improve fumitory or annual mercury control. FALCON (100g/l propaquizafop) can also be used as a post-emergence treatment and is of particular benefit where grass weeds such as Annual Meadow Grass and volunteer cereals are a concern (for example after cover-cropping).

For more information about any of the active ingredients or herbicides mentioned, please visit the ADAMA weed control.

*Users of GOLTIX should be aware that there has been a minor amendment to this product’s hazard classification, with spray operators now required to use appropriate Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) when using and handling this herbicide.