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WAGE! 



By 

 WILLIAM H. LACHMAN 

 Associate Research Professor, Olericulture 



Professor L< 

 and a half r 

 on weeds'- 



APPROXIMATELY THIRTY 

 percent of the cost of raising 

 crops is forfeited in the endless 

 war to control weeds — a serious 

 enemy of the market gardener. By 

 depriving crops of water and nu- 

 trients and harboring insects and 

 diseases, weeds reduce yields and 

 increase the cost of production. 



Recently developed control meth- 

 ods, which are generally more 

 effective, quicker, and less costly 

 than hand labor, are fast supplant- 

 ing the expensive hand-weeding and 

 hoeing sometimes required in weedy 

 fields of vegetables. 



Stoddard Solvent Cuts Costs 



A few of the newly discovered 

 chemicals are selective in nature. 

 That is, they may be applied di- 

 rectly to a field, killing the weeds 

 promptly without harming the crop. 

 Just such a material is Stoddard 

 Solvent, an oil long used as a solvent 



or cleaning fluid. When Stoddard 

 Solvent is sprayed on fields of young 

 carrots and parsnips, it literally 

 erases the weeds but does not harm 

 these particular crops. Farmers 

 have been unanimous in their 

 praise for this method and indicate 

 that one treatment is worth about 

 $90.00 per acre, the price of hand- 

 weeding, but costs only about 

 $25.00. 



2,4-D Varies in Toxicity 



Another very similar procedure 

 is the use of the widely heralded 

 2,4-D weedkiller in fields of sweet 

 corn. Here 2,4-D is sprayed on the 

 field of young corn to kill broad- 

 leafed weeds. (Grassy weeds are not 

 harmed by this treatment.) One 

 curious feature of this method, how- 

 ever, is the fact that 2,4-D is quite 

 toxic to certain varieties of sweet 

 corn and harmless to others. 



Test plot of spinach at right 

 sprayed with chloro-IPC im- 

 mediately after planting. The 

 plot at left received no treat- 

 ment. 



Photo by Robert L. Coffin. 



