The importance of scouting and monitoring
Maize is a critical crop for farmers across the country when it comes to grain and silage. Given the farming challenges, it is important to ensure return on investment by maximising yields.
A factor in this is making sure weeds, pests, and diseases are appropriately managed throughout the crop's life. This requires careful and frequent monitoring, and scouting of paddocks.
In a maize-on-maize situation, the scouting should start after the harvest of the previous crop. Walking across the paddock and identifying the weeds that made it through to harvest, you can plan for the current season’s herbicide programme. This is important in a silage system where you would have sprayed those weeds out post-harvest and planted annual ryegrass.
In a grain situation, if the ground has been left bare over winter, you might be able to skip to the next scouting period before spraying the paddock for planting. Use this opportunity to take care of harder to control weeds whilst still having full use of glyphosate and any number of other herbicides you can add without having to manage the selectivity of them to the maize plants. Both pre-planting scouting events help understand the upcoming weed spectrum, and allow making educated decisions for pre-emergent herbicide applications.
Once a decision has been made about the appropriate pre-emergent herbicide option, the crop has been planted, and the herbicide has been applied, continue to scout the crop for both pests and weeds. The two most common pests during this establishment phase are cutworms and slugs. Even with good preparation they can still cause issues if climatic conditions are ideal and pest populations are high. Repeat slug bait applications may be necessary so monitor populations even after applying bait.
Weed populations as low as four fathen plants per square metre have been shown to cause significant yield loss so don’t underestimate the importance of this post-emergence scouting period. Environmental conditions, weed pressure, and weed spectrum are reasons why weeds could have gotten through the pre-emergent herbicides. Start looking for germinating weeds soon after crop emergence so these can be identified early to give yourself a range of herbicide options. As the crop moves through its growth stages, the range of options available starts decreasing due to crop safety.
There will be insects, diseases, and nutrient deficiencies to look out for throughout the crops life too. These won't be an issue too often, but post-emergence checks will help identify them.
For help monitoring your maize crops this season, contact your local Technical Field Representative.
