Air November 29, 2000

Thank you Mark, and good morning everyone. I hope everyone had a good holiday weekend. The next 33 days are going to fly by (as December always does) so just buckle down and before you know it, we’ll be in to the true new millennium!

I have been receiving numerous questions and virtually all are weather related. It looks like we are going to end up with the 4th or 5th coldest November on record. What does this mean for all those little tasks that you meant to get done earlier but didn’t? Let’s go through the laundry list real quick this morning. Fertilizing wheat and spraying for weeds. As long as the ground isn’t frozen, fertilizing wheat, or bromegrass for that matter, is not a problem. If you are using one of the newer weed control products, meaning something other than 2,4-D and Banvel, then it’s probably okay to apply now, as long as the ground isn’t frozen. I’m afraid that for many of the weeds, we’ve had enough cold weather that they aren’t going to be very well controlled with 2,4-D and Banvel. The same goes for spraying bindweed or thistles right now. You probably need to put the 2,4-D and Banvel away until late winter. Keep in mind that we’ve already had temperatures as cold as we did all of last winter. Plants have shut down a lot of photosynthesis and temperatures just aren’t conducive to good activity. You could still treat thistles with products Tordon, Escort and Ally as long as the ground isn’t frozen. I’ve also had a couple of calls about cedar tree control now. We do not have a lot of herbicides for cedar trees. Tordon is certainly the most well known, and it does work. It is soil applied and takes special application equipment. It’s use is generally encouraged in April and May or September and October. Using it as a foliar treatment simply is not going to work very well. Interestingly, Tordon 22K is the only product that appears to be specifically labeled for controlling cedars. Roundup does have a fairly broad label for brush control BUT that would make me very nervous. And what with the heat and drought we’ve had this year, plus now the cold weather, I’d be rather suspect of how well it would work anyway! If you don’t have enough fuel to carry a fire next spring, the only other control option currently available is clipping at ground level. That should keep you warm on a cool autum day!

This is Chuck Otte, Geary County Extension Agent, with Ag Outlook 2000.

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