Harvest weed seed control (HWSC) provides an opportunity to target future weed populations. Our most problematic weed species are prolific seed producers capable of establishing a large viable seed bank in just one season. However, very high proportions of weed seed are retained on upright stems and tillers of weeds at crop maturity. This creates the potential to target these seed during grain crop harvest to restricting inputs to the weed seed bank.
While herbicides are part of the mix, mechanical methods are important in weed control too. The iHSD, which has now been commercialised, is a great example of that. The paper Harrington Seed Destructor: A new nonchemical weed control tool for global grain crop introduces the tool defined as the HSD and provides detailed information on the science behind how it works.
If you’d like to watch a bit more on the iHSD, AHRI’s Peter Newman joined unforgettable inventor and farmer Ray Harrington in 2016, accompanied by Devon Gilmour of McIntosh & Sons, to talk about the opportunities and challenges of incorporating the iHSD into Australia’s cropping systems. You can watch the webinar below:
If you’d like to find out more about the iHSD, you can access the paper:
M Walsh, R Harrington, S Powles, Crop Science 2012, Vol 52 pp 1343-1347
DOI: 10.2135/cropsci2011.11.0608
Abstract: https://dl.sciencesocieties.org/publications/cs/abstracts/52/3/1343
We’d encourage you to have a closer look at this paper to garner a detailed background on this revolutionary piece of machinery.
Follow the link below for further information:
