Clover herbicide

[Cooter]

Can someone tell me a couple brand names and/or generic names/active ingredient for a herbicide for my clover. Need broadleaf control, no grass problems. Suppose it will kill the chicory but somethings gotta be done. Thanks.

[HOF#13]

I had the same problem. Amine 24-D will work, but clover is tough to kill this time of year. I used a herbicide made for lawn use called Confront. It worked real well, but it takes about a week and a half before the clover really starts to look bad.

[Eric Wettschreck]

2-4-D. Apply once in spring, once in mid-summer, a good heavy shot in the fall.

Clover is tough to make a mid-summer kill. The fall application will do the most damage.

This will also kill the other broad leaf stuff you have so keep it away from things you want to keep around, like strawberries.

[Cooter]

Guess I didn't word the question very well - I planted the clover as a food plot. Just got too many weeds in it now. Not really concerned about the chicory, its a small % of the plot. Several kinds of broadleaf plants are taking over the clover. Am gonna mow it, but not sure that will fully correct the problem. Thanks for the replies, sorry about the wording.

[PerchJerker]

Mowing is your best bet, especially at this time of the year. A lot of the broadleaf weeds won't come back anymore and it will revitalize your clover. It might look ragged for a while but once we get cooler temps and your clover starts growing again it will look a lot better.

When you spray you want the weeds to be actively growing - probably not the case with this weather. But to spray broadleaf weeds and keep your clover the only 2 products I know of are 2,4D-B and Slay. 2,4D-B is hard to find but some farm supply stores or coops should have it. Slay is sold by the Whitetail Institute and is much more expensive than 2,4D-B. Slay is the private label version of the ag herbicide called Pursuit.

Some of the guys at QDM are talking about spraying clover with a light mix of RoundUp - only 1 pint/acre instead of the normal 2-3 pints - and having it kill the weeds but not the clover. I'm skeptical about it but have tried it a little - can't say yet if it works or not. I definately wouldn't try the RoubdUp technique unless you're willing to risk losing your whole food plot.

Good luck.

[Beeber]

Cooter, Depending on weed size and species the following herbicides are effective in clover stands for broadleaf and some grass control: Pursuit (imazethapyr), Raptor (imazamox), Basagran (bentazon). I'm sure there are others as well but these should give you a start. Ask your local Ag retailer for help in selecting a Herbicide and adjuvant package that will do the job for you.

Take care and have fun killing some weeds.

[Dotch]

Beeber speak 'um truth. Haven't seen enough data on Raptor and Pursuit sprayed on chicory to know what it would do but would be guessing that given the family it's in (composite), it likely wouldn't be good. What have you seen Beeber? Would caution against trying the reduced rate Round Up scenario mentioned above. As one who has been recommending & using Round Up for the last 25 years, at 1 pt./ac and on down to less than 8 oz./ac of the 41% active ingredient material, it will control primarily easy to kill annual grasses depending on size and environmental conditions. It will ding the clover however making it less competitive and may open it up for another flush of weed growth. The other problem is sprayer calibration. Using a 4 wheeler sprayer as many do, application rates tend to vary with your speed. Unless one has a pretty sophisticated model, most 4 wheeler sprayers run at a constant pressure and volume. Starting out slow on the end can result in multiple times the rate and a dead area in the plot, also from experience... Take heart though, Round Up Ready alfalfa was cleared earlier in the year for use in the US. Should be able to spray it to your heart's content.

[BLACKJACK]

Dotch, have they developed a Round-up ready sweet corn? I had good luck planting a two acre round up ready corn food plot this year, is sure would be nice to put a couple rows of sweet corn in there....

[Dotch]

Have been waiting for that myself but am not aware of any available commercially, yet. No doubt it's in the works but don't recall seeing it mentioned in Vegetable Grower magazine. Just imagine, raccoons not having to battle the weeds to get at your sweetcorn...

[skunk-ape]

If you do use some type of herbicide on your plot, make sure you don't use one containing Mecoprop or MCPP. Several 2-4-D herbicides contain MCPP. MCPP is a selective herbicide which is especially effective on clovers.

[Beeber]

Dotch,

I have never personally seen Pursuit or Raptor on chicory but I would guess you are right on them being weak on it. I would be a little nervous about the low rate of Roundup. Once you let the animal out of its cage it is hard to tell what it will do. To my knowledge there has not been a RR sweetcorn developed at least not approved. There is however a few sweetcorn varieties that carry the Liberty Link gene but Liberty herbicide is not labeled for use on sweetcorn. If you ever see Attribute protected sweetcorn (BT) the LL gene was used to ensure gene insertion was successful. Again, Liberty is NOT labeled for use in sweetcorn.

[Cooter]

Thanks for the replies. I mowed it about a week and a half ago. Haven't looked at it yet, just got back from Mexico. Heard we got some rain over the weekend. Its a small enough plot that if weeds continue to be a problem, I will just Roundup the whole thing this fall and early spring and then replant.