The need for a rotation away from existing chemistries brought Overwatch® Herbicide forward as an excellent option this season on the Clifton property at Weethalle in southern New South Wales.
Phill Clifton is a part of a family farming enterprise together with his parents and three brothers and farms the property north of Weethalle with cereal and oilseed crops.
“A good rotation is canola, wheat and barley,” he said. “The rotation breaks up the chemistry and is good for the country as well.”
Pre-emergent herbicides previously used on the property include Sakura*, Boxer Gold* and trifluralin.
Mr Clifton said trifluralin in particular gets used quite a bit and they are concerned about weeds developing resistance to it. That chemistry is no longer as effective as it once was.
“Obviously we're trying to get away from that to mix it up a bit and make sure we keep that one as long as we can."
As part of that rotation, they introduced Overwatch® Herbicide into wheat for the first time in the 2023 season and were very pleased with the results.
“We were pretty impressed with it,” Mr Clifton said. “We've really only had to come back later on with a cosmetic spray for a few broadleaves and a little bit of volunteer canola. It’s been really good.”
While ryegrass was the main weed targeted, the area treated had some other ones that Overwatch® Herbicide was effective on.
“It was pretty reasonable with wild oats and milk thistle,” Mr Clifton said. “We've been very happy with Overwatch® Herbicide.”
He said pre-emergent chemistry was a vital component of their weed control program, so every effort needed to be made to keep all options viable for the longer term.
“Up here pre-emergent chemistry is a game changer. You can’t farm without it. We used Overwatch® to get away from some of the other groups to mix up the different chemistries.”
Overwatch® Herbicide has been on the market for a few years and Mr Clifton said he had heard of some crops being temporarily bleached by the herbicide.
With this in mind he worked with his local agronomist, Nick Hunt, from Nutrien, West Wyalong, to fine tune the application and sowing.
“I think, the right sowing machine, sowing speed and seed depth at sowing are key to getting it right with Overwatch®."
“We sow with a DBS Ausplow on 300 mm spacings with an 18-metre bar. We slowed the sowing rig down that extra half a kilometre per hour to under 8 km/hr and made sure we got really good seed placement. It’s just a management thing with Overwatch®. Good seed placement is definitely key to make it work.”
He said the success of Overwatch® Herbicide is something they have used to mix their chemistries up and help all products remain viable for longer.
“We've had a great run with Overwatch®. Going forward it will be a continuing part of the rotation. It's a great tool to keep in the shed and it will be around for many years to come.”
“I've heard of some people getting good results with it in their canola so it'd be something we may consider going forward."
The 2023 season was quite dry but benefited from the previous year’s rain with a full profile of moisture going into planting.
“April and May are our main sowing months,” Mr Clifton said. “We like to get going by the 15th of April with canola and start cereals in the first week of May.”
