Reducing seed production using late post-emergence applications of selective herbicides to manage wild oat ('Avena' spp.) populations

Abstract

'Avena' spp. (wild oats) continue to persist as a major weed of winter cereal crops as most control strategies fail to contain wild oat populations. From a review of literature it was concluded that the primary mechanism for wild oat persistence in Australia was associated with in-crop seed production, not seed dormancy as appeared to be the case for most northern hemisphere wheat growing countries. Late germination and recruitment of wild oat seedlings and incomplete kill of wild oat plants were likely causes of survival and subsequent seed production. It was also concluded from a review of literature that two herbicides, flamprop (and its various analogues of flamprop) and fenoxaprop-p-ethyl, exhibit potential to selectively reduce wild oat seed production if applied late post-emergence in wheat or barley. Time of application appears to be an important factor affecting efficacy of these herbicides.