Monsanto is continuing to take inquiries into their dicamba herbicide XtendiMax with VaporGrip Technology. As of July 12, the company has received 381 inquiries from 240 unique farmer and applicator calls about potential off-target movement.
“As we’ve walked fields with growers and applicators, we’ve continued to remind them that regardless of the herbicide you’re spraying, it’s critically important to read and follow all label requirements,” said Dr. Ty Witten, North America Crop Protection Lead, Monsanto Technology Development & Agronomy.
For low-volatility dicamba, do not spray if wind is blowing toward a susceptible crop; understand the wind and environmental conditions for each and every application; follow all of the other label requirements; and use only approved, low-volatility formulations in-crop.
“We continue to see some instances where symptomology appears to have resulted from off-label dicamba applications, and we’re also still finding that dicamba is not always the cause of observed symptomology,” Witten said.
In Illinois, for example, Monsanto has heard from a few counties in Central Illinois where they have observed some fields with uniform symptomology, though those same fields are seeing continued active growth. That symptomology appears to have resulted from adjacent fields, and in most situations, there is more than one potential Group 4 herbicide source field (corn, small grains, etc.) or area adjacent to the reported affected inquiry field.
“In most of these fields we continue to observe multiple factors that may be the reason for observed symptomology, and it remains critically important we walk fields and examine all possible options before drawing conclusions,” Witten said.
Also as of July 12, Monsanto had received 506 inquiries about weed performance and 0 inquiries about crop response. Within inquiries around weed performance, they’ve received questions on a variety of weeds, including several grasses that aren’t controlled by the dicamba mode of action.
“In visits regarding grasses, we’ve found applicators are lowering the rate of glyphosate. We’ve been reminding growers it’s critically important to use full rates when applying any herbicide,” Witten said. “We’ve also found weed performance inquiries involving applications that occurred too late, once a weed was larger than 4” or in a flowering stage.”
Monsanto encourages any grower who believes there’s symptomology on a field to contact them as quickly as possible at 1-844-RRXTEND.
