New Tool To Fight Weeds To Be Tested In Louisiana

The Louisiana Soybean Grain Research and Promotion Board awarded a grant to LSU Weed Scientist Dr. Lauren Lazaro to find ways of controlling weeds at harvest through a tactic called Harvest Weed Seed Control. Lazaro’s soybean board grant focuses on one form of HWSC called chaff lining. An additional HWSC method is the use of impact mills. 

"Now there's another level of harvest weed seed control that uses an impact mill that goes into the rear of the combine that pulverizes the chaff material and weed seed that comes through it," says Lazaro.  "It essentially throws the material around the mill and shoots it out, including the broken-up weed seed." 

Lazaro goes on to announce the LSU AgCenter will actually be getting two of these impact mills next year, "So we will be one of the first in the Southern US to really have this equipment to test in various cropping systems through a multi-state, nationwide trial." 

Lazaro says she's really excited harvest weed seed control is coming to Louisiana "and hopefully these different tactics, which can be fit to a farmer’s needs, will provide an additional weed management tool to help reduce weed pressures."