After a cold snap that sent temperatures below freezing, heavy spring rains have added to concerns in corn-growing regions across the Midwest and Great Plains. Choosing herbicides with wide application windows and powerful residual protection can help protect fields against weeds that appear after stretches of wet weather.

One-pass herbicide programs can help save growers time and money if effective, but heavy rains can wash herbicides out of fields altogether. Using preemergence-only or pre-V2 herbicides can leave growers especially vulnerable to this threat, since many corn fields may be beyond the V2 stage by the time the Midwest dries out in the coming weeks.

To avoid needing to make late herbicide purchases in reaction to weather events, we recommend choosing herbicides with wide application windows. Acuron®, Acuron Flexi, Lexar® EZ and Lumax® EZ corn herbicides can all be applied post-emergence up to 12” corn in a 1-pass program. The top products in their market categories, all 4 herbicides offer long residuals that outperform competitive products.

Depending on a field’s weed presence, these products can also be used in combination with certain glyphosate or dicamba brands. To avoid weed resistance, always use recommended rates.

Warm weather in the next few weeks should speed up corn metabolism after many fields got off to a slow start after the spring frosts across the central U.S. As they apply post-emergence herbicides, growers may notice some plant response to products, including flashing (white spots) from HPPD herbicides. In most cases, plants with small spots will recover within a few days.

Some growers may want to wait to apply post-emergence herbicides to avoid plant reactions to herbicide products. Whether it’s better to apply now or wait depends on the weed pressure and amount of water in a specific field.

Contact your Syngenta sales representative for help identifying the right weed management plan for your area.

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