Reducing herbicide use and leaching in agronomically performant maize-based cropping systems: An 8-year study.

Irrigated maize-based Cropping Systems (CS) are questioned because of the high risk of herbicide transfer to water. An 8-year systemic experiment was conducted to i) compute a multi-performance comparison between a Conventional Maize Monoculture (MMConv) and four CS that aimed to reduce irrigation and herbicide leaching: MMLI, a low-input MM using cover crop and Integrated Weed Management (IWM) techniques; MMStill, a Strip-tillage MM using cover crop; MMCT, a Conservation Tillage MM with cover crop; Maize-MSW, an IWM Maize rotated with Soybean and Wheat and ii) determine the main drivers and evaluate the influence of CS on herbicide leaching in maize. Drainage water was collected through 1-m depth lysimeter plates and analysed for 6 herbicide molecules and 1 degradation metabolite. MMLI yielded 10.7 t ha-1 close to MMConv (11.5 t ha-1) despite a lower herbicide use (-57%) and irrigation (-21%). MMLI and Maize-MSW had less drainage events compared to MMConv. MMCT and MMStill both yielded less (respectively 7.6 t ha-1 and 6.2 t ha-1) while their herbicide use increased (both +24%). Mean annual herbicide losses were 0.5 ± 1.0 g ha-1 for MMLI, 0.7 ± 1.2 g ha-1 for Maize-MSW, 1.3 ± 2.1 g ha-1 for MMStill, 2.0 ± 4.8 g ha-1 MMConv and 3.0 ± 9.6 g ha-1 for MMCT. Herbicide leaching remained variable but was consistently and mostly influenced by drainage volume. According to the CS, only 1.5 to 6.0 drainage events were responsible for 90% of the herbicide losses. High leaching peaks were identified for mesotrione and glyphosate and may indicate that preferential flows occurred, especially under MMCT. Quantity applied had limited influence on herbicide leaching. To reduce the herbicide leaching risk, CS must concomitantly manage water quality and quantity through a combination of agroecological practices, as in MMLI, a CS able to reach other technical objectives. Present study recommends assessing CS through a diversity of performance indicators.

Effects of halving pesticide use on wheat production.

Pesticides pose serious threats to both human health and the environment. In Europe, farmers are encouraged to reduce their use, and in France a recent environmental policy fixed a target of halving the pesticide use by 2018. Organic and integrated cropping systems have been proposed as possible solutions for reducing pesticide use, but the effect of reducing pesticide use on crop yield remains unclear. Here we use a set of cropping system experiments to quantify the yield losses resulting from a reduction of pesticide use for winter wheat in France. Our estimated yield losses resulting from a 50% reduction in pesticide use ranged from 5 to 13% of the yield obtained with the current pesticide use. At the scale of the whole country, these losses would decrease the French wheat production by about 2 to 3 millions of tons, which represent about 15% of the French wheat export.

Evaluation of Inoculation Methods to Reproduce Sunflower Premature Ripening Caused by Phoma macdonaldii.

Three inoculation methods were evaluated for effectiveness to cause sunflower premature ripening (PR). Evaluations were conducted on a sunflower (Helianthus annuus) cultivar susceptible to PR in replicated, multilocation experiments under greenhouse conditions. Plants were inoculated with Phoma macdonaldii, either with mycelium, conidia, or infected residues at the stem base or with buried residues. Disease severity (DS) was measured by percent girdling necrosis at the stem base and percent final PR; the infection spread was assessed using the area under the disease progress curve (AUDPC). Inoculation with mycelia or 1 × 106 spores/ml caused significantly more DS and PR than lower spore concentrations or infected residues (P < 0.05). Amending soil with residues induced root necrosis but no PR. P. macdonaldii was mainly isolated at the stem base and above but rarely on root systems. Microscopic evaluations showed that hyphae colonized mainly the cortex and vascular stem tissues. The overall results demonstrated a clear role of aerial infection in PR compared with soilborne inoculum, and that inoculation at the stem base with a spore suspension could be used for screening genotypes for resistance to PR.