Mustard Seed To Kill Weeds

Gardening

oi-Staff

By Staff

Tuesday, January 6, 2009, 12:20

You no longer have to rush to hunt the best pesticide, all you have to do is apply a little bit of white mustard seed meals in the soil to kill weed and broadleaf weeds.

The pungent smell in the white mustard is due to the presence of Sinalbin, the same compound that suppresses the growth of weed in the soil, as told by a study at Agricultural Research Service.

A research conducted by Agronomist Rick Boydston, with the ARS Vegetable and Forage Crops Research Unit in Prosser, Washington, is conducting the studies with plant physiologist Steven Vaughn, at the ARS National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research in Peoria, evaluated that the effective application are half a ton, one ton and two tons per acre.

The best of the three applications is one-ton and two-ton rates. When applied for the peppermint, there was a remarkable reduction in the growth of barnyard grass, green foxtail, common lambsquarters, henbit and redroot pigweed populations by 90 percent.

Though the peppermint plant suffered minor side affect of the mustard seed application, it soon resumed its healthy growth. However when treated to potted rose, phlox, coreopsis and pasque flower, the treatment killed or reduced the growth of annual bluegrass, common chickweed, creeping woodsorrel and liverwort.

About 86-98 percent of the chickweed seedlings died and the surviving ones were weaker and shorter. Other than white mustard, the other weed control applicants are pennycress seed meal and dried distiller grains (DDGs), that are derived from corn ethanol production.

The researchers aim at providing better solutions to the farmers in crop production. They aim to offer alternatives to hand-pulling, burning and other laborious methods of weed control. It would be a breakthrough if mustard is found to be useful as a biodiesel, as it would not be a risk to environmental AGENCIES