How do residues in grain crops affect marketing? What are maximum residue limits (MRLs) and what should growers know about them? How should you set up an optical sprayer? And what influences efficacy when summer spraying?
These practical on-farm questions will be answered for growers at the Grains Research and Development Corporation (GRDC) Northern Downs Spray Forum and Optical Sprayer Demonstration day being held at Inverai Pioneer Memorial Hall, west of Jandowae, on Tuesday, November 26.
The workshop is a grower-led initiative of the Brigalow Growers' Group and has received financial investment from the GRDC, but the event is open to the wider farming community.
GRDC Crop Protection Manager – North Vicki Green said the spray day was an example of how the GRDC was working collaboratively with growers in response to requests for up-to-date, best practice information to help guide on-farm decision making.
"This workshop was grower-driven and reflected one community's determination to provide its growers with the latest, accurate information to help ensure responsible use of chemicals on-farm," Mrs Green said.
"The Brigalow Grower Group was very proactive and had a clear understanding of what topics they wanted covered so it was easy to work with them to develop a workshop with content that would appeal to a wide range of growers."
Neil Wegener from the group said the aim of the event was to improve growers' understanding of safe spray practices to ensure that any negative impacts of spray drift or chemical misuse were minimised on the Darling Downs.
"We realise the issue of responsible chemical use is important for all of us working in agriculture, not just the grains sector," he said.
"So, it has been great to work with the GRDC to bring this together for the wider community."
The Northern Downs spray day is open to all growers, farm advisers, agronomists and industry stakeholders from the grains, cotton and horticultural industries.
Facilitated by Mark Congreve from ICAN, topics to be covered include:
- Pesticide residues in grains crops – want do customers want?
- What are maximum residue levels (MRLs) and withholding periods (WHPs) and why are they important?
- Why have there been changes to 2,4-D use requirements and how do they affect growers?
- SataCrop – a new mapping system for the identification of sensitive crops.
- How can growers optimise herbicide performance when using coarser spray quality?
- Common water quality issues and what can be done to remedy them?
- How to set up optical sprayers and the pros and cons of using them.
Another highlight of the day will be a range of practical machinery demonstrations including Weedit Quadro, WeedSeeker2 and the 'green-on-green' technology being developed by Bilberry and Agrifac.
What: Northern Downs Spray Forum and Optical Sprayer Demonstration
Where: Inverai Pioneer Memorial Hall (1911 Warra Canaga Creek Road)
When: Tuesday, November 26
Time: 8.30am-4.30pm
