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Drift injuries reported with new dicamba formulations

Weed scientist Kevin Bradley says there are reports of dicamba drift injury, including with legal applications of the herbicide.

“All I can say is, in Missouri, the ones I’m aware of, they’re all the new formations that have been applied,” Bradley told Brownfield Ag News Thursday, “and we still have some off-target movement.”

Dicamba approved in the last year for application in-crop over tolerant soybeans, BASF Enginia and Monsanto XtendiMax, are formulated to be less volatile, and to reduce drift onto sensitive crops.

Bradley, at the University of Missouri, says a greater number of dicamba drift complaints have been made in Arkansas, because its season is ahead of Missouri’s.  He says farmer applications in Missouri began with more frequency about a week ago.

“Usually that would mean that sometime next week, or the week after, if there is a problem, we’ll probably start getting a load of calls around those applications,” he said.

In most cases, says Bradley, growers closely follow label directions when applying dicamba, although “there are always one or two who may not do what they’re supposed to.”

AUDIO: Kevin Bradley (12 min. MP3)