Hi Bob. What's being tried in Illinois and nearby is burning weeds with
propane burners. I saw a demo recently on beans that had a lot of
foxtail and a few broadleaf weeds, like cockleburs. The owner said the
broadleaf's died, but the grass wasn't greatly affected. Another
Illinois farmer said he does it right after planting and it does a good
job. It doesn't hurt soybeans much even when they get singed. It works
on corn too, tho I don't know if you can wait as long. The cost of the
propane was about $3 or $4 per acre. It's approved by OCIA. There's a
guy in S. Minn. who builds the flamer implements. My bro is thinking of
making one for our farm. I heard that another guy used a combine to mow
off weeds above his beans. He may have only used the head with mower bar
run by a tractor. What I plan to do about weeds is plant wheat and rye
this fall, if we get enuf time, and plant beans in them in the spring. I
figure the beans will get a slow start, but should grow fast after the
wheat is harvested and they should stay cleaner. I heard of someone who
plants beans and rye together in the spring. The rye dies in July or so
and the beans stay pretty clean. I doubt if electricity would be
practical, but if you prove me wrong, please tell us about it. One other
method is to plant rye and vetch in late summer and then plant corn or
beans in rows in it in the spring and use citric acid or vinegar to
spray on the rye and vetch between the rows to kill it. It's supposed to
keep weeds down well. But I don't know how to adapt a sprayer offhand.
That's also supposed to be pretty cheap. Another tip for better yields
is to spray food or tech grade 35% hydrogen peroxide on crops once or
twice per season. I know of a source for that in 2.5 gallon jugs.
--- As for the person's suggestion to use RoundUp on Johnson grass, we
did that last year and a lot of it came back this year. I sprayed some
again this year with RoundUp, but it's not promising, so I gave up on
that. We plan to just plant the grass strips in buckwheat or hay and
keep cutting it and maybe disk in the winter, as others suggest. We
decided to go completely organic from now on and kick our dependence on
big biz. Aloha. Lloyd
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