Many cereal and oilseed rape growers are struggling to overcome armies of slugs feasting on newly emerged crops, according to latest reports from FWi’s agronomy team.

Suffolk-based Brian Ross of Frontier reckons this is “the worst year” he has seen for slugs.

“A lot of rape in this area has finally managed to come through, but despite baiting is still being destroyed virtually overnight.

“I cannot overstress the importance of constantly monitoring fields at risk.”

Wheat and barley are also under attack, particularly after rape and in cloddy seedbeds.

Procrop’s Bryce Rham said slug feeding was the worst he had seen in Shropshire for some years.

“Deter (clothianidin) has been very disappointing in terms of stopping hollowing – we almost lost some crops before they came through.

“Slug numbers in some fields are horrendous and we are having to make several applications just to get enough baiting points.”

Slow germination has added to problems, says AICC agronomist Patrick Stephenson.

“Despite cereals going into reasonably good seedbeds (eventually) germination has been sedate to say the least.

“Crop walking is like watching paint dry!”

But early drilled cereals are now emerged and the first post-emergence herbicides are being applied.

Dormancy is an issue for blackgrass with stale seedbeds producing very little flush and post-emergence numbers also very variable.

He and ProCam’s Nick Brown (Berks, Bucks and Oxon) also highlight uneven rape establishment.

“Crops range from fully expanded cotyledons to 4-6 leaves, sometimes in the same field,” says Mr Brown.

The coming weeks will mean great care with slug and pigeon control, in wheat as well.

“Early seedbeds on heavy ground proved rather cloddy to say the least and in some instances slugs have hollowed out grain despite best efforts at control.”

Most of Mr Brown’s wheat crops have received a pre-emergence spray. In some fields blackgrass populations are high and in others seed dormancy remains a problem.

“Crops with high blackgrass levels will be treated shortly with an IPU/Hawk mix to take some pressure off Atlantis later on.” 

To read any of the reports in full, click on the links above, or select one of the following regions:
North (Patrick Stephenson)
East (Brian Ross)
South (Nick Brown)
West (Bryce Rham) 

Cropping query? Why not post it on FWi’s Crops comments forum?