Summary of Certified Crop Advisors’ Response to a Weed Resistance Survey

Nearly 400 herbicide-resistant weed biotypes due to one or several modes of action have been documented worldwide. Certified crop advisors (CCAs) were surveyed in December 2012 about the attitudes of clients toward resistant weeds and management. About 10% of total U.S. (∼1000 North Central, 60 Northeast, 165 West, and 257 South and Southeast regions) and Canadian (232) CCAs responded to the survey. Results were grouped by country, U.S. region, and job classification, with differences identified using χ2 analysis. Twenty-three percent of the South and Southeast regions CCAs identified the weed resistance level in their territory as “heavy,” whereas 5.5% identified the level as “epidemic,” compared with 0 in these categories for Canadian CCAs and CCAs in the U.S. Northeast and West regions. About 1% of CCAs in sales identified weed resistance as “epidemic,” compared with 5.6% of agriculture manufacturer representatives. Resistance management tactics listed frequently included multiple modes of action (20%), herbicide or crop rotation (16% each), and preemergence or residual herbicide application (14%), whereas integrated pest management was listed \u3c2% of the time. In the South and Southeast regions, about 50% of the respondents thought that producers would modify current production practices “…only if the resistant weed were present in their fields,” whereas 37 and 31% of the North Central and Northeast/West regions, respectively, chose this answer. The cost of resistance implementation was seen as a primary barrier to implementation by 24% of the Northeast/West, North Central, and Canadian respondents. These findings suggest that solutions for weed resistance must be effective, easily implemented, and cost conscious to maximize acceptance and implementation by farmers