Save on labor

Photos courtesy of Samuel Drahn

OHP offers a variety of herbicides for growers and nurseries. The company has four pre-emergent herbicides – Casoron® 4G, Biathlon®, Fortress® and Fuerte™. It also has an OMRI-listed post emergent herbicide, FireWorxx™.

“Growers can use the products to establish a good rotational strategy for weed control,” says Samuel Drahn, technical manager at OHP.

Casoron® 4G helps growers clean up their fields of troublesome weeds. This herbicide is designed for field production and targets those difficult to control perennial weeds such as thistles, nutsedge, horsetail and coltsfoot.

The active ingredient in Casoron® 4G is dichlobenil, which acts by inhibiting germination, and actively dividing cells of meristems of growing points and root tips; thereby, inhibiting cell division through cellulose synthesis. Casoron® 4G prevents weed seeds, emerging shoots and certain existing weeds from growing.

Casoron® 4G requires ½ to 1 inch of overhead watering to thoroughly incorporate granules to a depth of 4-6 inches in the soil. Applications should be made under cool weather conditions in late fall or very early spring.

Biathlon® (oxyfluorfen + prodiamine), Fortress® (isoxaben + dithopyr) and Fuerte™ (flumioxazin + prodiamine) are primarily used to control weeds in container ornamentals. All three of these products are made of a combination of two active ingredients which improve their weed control spectrum.

“Fortress® was designed for perennials, ornamental grasses and real tender plants,” Drahn says. “The other two, Biathlon® and Fuerte™ are stronger materials and should just be used on woody shrubs and trees.”

Biathlon®, Fortress® and Fuerte™ are all formulated on the Verge® granule.

“It’s a nice carrier that has very low dust,” Drahn says. “It’s mostly uniform in particle size and distribution. That particle size is round, so it really bounces off foliage and stems, down on to the soil surface where you want them, rather than some of the flatter or flakier material that tends to stick or lay flat on foliage.”

All three of those products (Biathlon®, Fortress® and Fuerte™) need to be watered in after the application to solubilize that product and form that chemical weed barrier on the soil surface. These three products are grower friendly and require minimal personal protective equipment (PPE) – long sleeved shirt, pants, water-proof gloves and socks plus shoes.

“Eye wear is not on the label, but I always recommend with any applications eye wear as well,” Drahn says. … “It’s really just a great tool for growers to save labor and free up people to do other tasks. As people and their time are a hard commodity right now, these pre-emergents help free them up to do other things in the nursery instead of hand weed.”

FireWorxx™ is an OMRI-listed post emergent herbicide for control of weeds in greenhouse, nursery and landscape ornamentals, grounds maintenance and non-cropland areas. FireWorxx™ is a fast-acting, non-selective broadleaf weed, grass, algae and moss killer.

“It has a wide use range from 3-9%,” Drahn says. “The 3% is to target those soft no merged weeds, 6% works very well on liverwort and 9% gets up into those really difficult to control, small woody plants. It’s a post emergent, contact burn only, so there’s no risk of volatilization. If you apply it to something, it will burn it. It won’t move or volatilize to burn other things. It’s great for cleaning up greenhouse edges, alongside the containers and flats, just in those growing areas where you need to clean up. Bittercress is probably the most prolific of the weeds across north America, and 4% does an excellent job of burning them down.”

It’s also listed for organic use, so it’s very helpful for those who need that certification in their program and makes a great replacement for applicators concerned with glyphosate based herbicides.

“Every grower needs to sell pots that are weed free,” Drahn says. “The market and consumer expect weed free pots, so by using pre-emergents and post emergents successfully, growers can reduce the amount of people necessary to do weeding. It’s a great tool to save money by spending less on hand weeding and allowing those people to do other tasks in the nursery.”

For more: www.ohp.com