Herbicides

Pesticide usage can be damaging to both the environment and the user of the chemical, but taking precautions greatly reduces the risk to both.

Rat's tail fescue can become dominant where ploughing is not practiced due to limited effective chemical options, writes Vijaya Bhaskar of Teagasc Oak Park.

Some weeds have developed resistance to herbicides. Teagasc is collecting weed seed samples from farmers to test for resistance for free.

Tillage farmers are busy managing spring crops and drier weather appears to be on the way to help with this.

When the Irish Farmers Journal visited Co Louth last week we saw a huge mix of crops from good to poor.

The wet weather is still having an impact on potato planting, Teagasc has said. They are advising growers to get the main crops in as soon as possible.

This is a handy tool for farmers to use when spraying, walking crops and when filling out crop records.