Physical weed control in organic chicory cultivated in the Fucino Valley (South Italy)

A two years field experiment (2004-2005) was carried out in the Fucino Valley. The aim was to compare different strategies for physical weed control in organic chicory. Chicory is the second most important vegetable crop of the area after carrot. The physical weed control strategy included the stale seed-bed technique before crop transplanting and one or more mechanical and manual interventions after transplanting. Three different operative machines two meters wide were adopted for false seed-bed technique: a rolling harrow, a flame weeder and a spring tine harrow. A conventional hoe or a specific innovative precision hoe with six units (45 cm of inter-row) were used to perform both inter-row and intra-row (by means of torsion weeders) weed control. During the testing period weed flora (density and biomass) was monitored and chicory yield was recorded. In addition, work chains characteristics and manpower use were determined. The results were quite interesting and stressed the chicory high quality yield, under the different physical weed control strategies.