Page 36 - 2019 Ag Mag

36 Integrated Pest Management
KMAland 2019
noxious weed to increase aware- in March 2017, with the forma- plish the work described above,
ness. tion of a local team consisting has been meeting every other
Two major things happened in of farmers, landowners, bankers, month for the past two years.
2017 to combat pest resistance in agronomists, crop advisors, seed As project team leader, I am ex-
Iowa. 1. The noxious weed law in company and chemical company tremely pleased in how this proj-
Iowa was updated to, among other representatives and ISU staff. ect is evolving, the interest that it
things, include Palmer amaranth; While the initial project focus and is receiving from all stakeholders
2. The IPRMP was officially charge was Palmer amaranth, the and especially how this great team
started in January 2017. I was team expanded the focus to in- continues to work well together.
part of the team that held a press clude three other weeds that are a All are extremely passionate and
conference in Des Moines to an- current resistance problem in the concerned about pest resistance.
nounce the start of this program. county: waterhemp, marestail and The team members devote a lot
The IPRMP, among other things, giant ragweed. The project so far of time, energy and thought to
envisioned pilot projects to fo- consists of basically four elements: this project because they all know
cus on dealing with area-specific collection of weed seeds for labo- and feel, as I do, that we have to
pest resistance that is occurring ratory testing to determine the address this pest resistance issue
throughout Iowa. Those pilots degree of resistance to herbicide now. If we do not, the impacts to
are corn rootworm in Northeast families; field testing of various Iowa crop farmers and the rural
Iowa, soybean aphids in North- herbicides for control of weeds in Iowa economy will be lower prof-
west Iowa, waterhemp in Cen- both corn and soybeans; field days itability resulting from reduced
tral Iowa and Palmer amaranth to demonstrate what works, what yields, increased costs or both.
in Harrison County, Iowa. An does not work and to what de- Reliance on herbicides is here to
objective of the IPRMP and that gree; and outreach to share what stay. Relying on the hope that a
of the pilots is slow the evolution the IPRMP is, what the Harrison new herbicide will be developed
of pest adaptation to chemical, County pilot project is, what we that permanently solves all resis-
genetic and agronomic control are doing, what we aim to achieve tance issues is not realistic. We
practices that lead to resistance. and what we are learning that can cannot go back to the way farm-
This effort is voluntary, and it in- and should be used by all engaged ing was done in the 1950s, with
corporates adaptive management in crop agriculture. total reliance on multiple pass
as we adjust what we need to do as The outreach part of the project tillage — that is not 21st century
the learning process occurs within is highly important. All involved agriculture, where we must grow
these projects. in agriculture need to realize that more food while focusing on soil
pest resistance is here in Iowa, and health and water quality. Now we
There’s work to go be- it is getting worse. We all need to must add pest resistance manage-
yond the ‘IPRMP’ be thinking of how to deal with it, ment to our list of crop-related
Combatting pest resistance in slow it down and prevent it from decisions.
Iowa is not just the responsibility progressing. Farmers need to be
of farmers, but that of the entire aware of pest resistance problems For more information on the
agricultural community: farm- as soon as they show up in their Harrison County Pilot Project,
ers, landowners, bankers, seed fields so they can take the appro- I can be contacted at l-bbuss@
companies, chemical companies, priate action to manage them. windstream.net or by cell phone
Iowa State University, Iowa De- The Harrison County Pilot at 712-269-2989. For more infor-
partment of Agriculture, EPA, Project has been highly success- mation on the statewide IPRMP,
etc. The Harrison County Pest ful because of the team members visit the website at www.protec-
Resistance Project was launched involved. This team, to accom- tiowacrops.org.