The August company, one of the largest Russian producers of pesticides, has laid demonstration experiments on the use of herbicides in the fight against Sosnovsky's hogweed in the Mozhaisk urban district. A month after the start, the head of the district Denis Mordvintsev visited the demonstration test site, as well as representatives of the administrations of other municipalities of the Moscow region. Working solutions of "Augusta" preparations showed excellent results: seedlings of a dangerous weed were destroyed in most of the treated area.
“The fight against hogweed is an important topic, which is one of the priorities in our district in the spring-summer period. A total of 2598 hectares are planned for processing. At present, its first stage has been completed, ”said the head of the district Denis Mordvintsev.
Demonstration tests were organized by the herbicides department of the industrial direction of Firma Avgust JSC and Agrocomplex Mozhaisky LLC, a company that has been one of the municipality's contractors in the fight against hogweed for the third year already.
“Today, 30 people are taking part in the execution of municipal contracts on our part, 6 cars, 6 tractors, 10 attachments, 20 individual sprayers are also involved. In our work, we use tank mixes of the "August" company. We focus on the use of selective drugs that destroy hogweed, but at the same time do not affect cereal grasses, allowing them to grow in its place, "said Igor Ognev, Deputy Director of Agrocomplex Mozhaisky LLC.
The specialists of the herbicides department of the industrial direction of the "August" company set themselves the task of showing how combinations of drugs with different properties can cope with a pest plant. On May 7, 2021, at the site designated for testing, experiments were carried out with tank mixtures of the following drugs:
1. “Tornado 500”, BP (3,5) + “Magnum” (0,1) + “Allure”, F (0,2) + “Soylent”;
2. “Tornado 500”, BP (3,5) + “Gorgon” (3,0) + “Magnum” (0,05) + “Soylent”;
3. "Tornado 540", BP (3,0) + "Deimos" (2,5) + "Soylent";
4. "Euron", (0,2) + "Gorgon" (2,5) + "Adyu" (0,2);
5. "Euron", (0,3) + "Tornado, 500" (2,5) + "Allure";
6. Tornado 540, BP (3,0) + Hacker (0,2) + Magnum (0,05) + Allure + Soylent;
7. "Grader", VGR (3,5) + "Soylent".
Mixtures containing general exterminating drugs "Euron" (active ingredient sulfometuron-methyl) and "Grader" (active ingredient imazapir) are intended primarily for the treatment of non-agricultural areas, such as railways, roads or security zones of power lines, gas and oil pipelines. Their impact on the soil, as a rule, lasts up to two years, preventing trees and shrubs from appearing in the cultivated area. The rest of the tank mixtures are oriented towards wider application.
Most working solutions contain glyphosate-containing herbicides of the Tornado trademark - continuous-action preparations that allow you to quickly cope with the green mass of the plant, including at the later stages of development (Tornado 540, BP). Glyphosate-containing herbicides have no effect on the soil, and, therefore, on new shoots and germinating hogweed seeds. However, selective drugs that remain in the soil for a long time (in particular, "Gorgon" and "Magnum") do not allow new weed seedlings to appear, but at the same time do not interfere with the spread of such a plant as creeping wheatgrass, as well as other cereals. The tinning effect, as a rule, is partially manifested by the fall, and is fully expressed in the next year after processing.
Representatives of the administration of the Mozhaisky urban district and other municipalities of the Moscow region assessed how the "Augusta" tank mixtures work in the short term. Within a month, on 6 out of 7 experimental plots, hogweed seedlings treated with herbicides before the stalking phase stopped growing, a significant part of them completely dried out, the leaves of the remaining seedlings turned yellow and deformed. The cow parsnip in the area treated with the Grader herbicide, a drug that appears to act more slowly than other herbicides, also changed color, and its growth was inhibited compared to plants in untreated areas in the neighborhood. By the fall, the weed will completely die on this site.
As noted by the representative of "August" Yuri Dyakonov, who is a consultant to the government of the Moscow region in the implementation of a comprehensive program to combat hogweed, ideally the use of this or that herbicide should depend on further plans for the site: if it is not planned for construction or agricultural work, then mixtures that ensure its tinning with cereals are the best option.
“It should be noted that today the market for plant protection products is experiencing a shortage of glyphosate. Thus, the price of glyphosate-containing preparations is growing, and they are losing their main advantage, due to which they, in particular, were chosen to combat hogweed - cheapness. As a result, today the use of more modern methods of exterminating hogweed using selective herbicides can cost about the same amount as the usual glyphosate-containing preparations, ”the expert points out.
During the demonstration of the use of herbicides, the specialists of "August" gave the representatives of the municipalities of the Moscow region a number of recommendations on how to combat hogweed, including when exactly the area contaminated with a pest plant should be treated, how to avoid unnecessary overspending of drugs and how to control blemishes spraying (for this it is recommended to use coloring pigments in the composition of working solutions).