The Minnesota Department of Agriculture is proposing state-specific restrictions for dicamba use for the 2022 growing season to help minimize off-target spray drift damage. Some of the recommendations came from the Minnesota Dicamba Task Force chaired by farmer Bob Worth. He says MDA is meeting with the Environmental Protection Agency and dicamba product manufacturers to get approval for an earlier spray cutoff date in the southern half of Minnesota and an 85-degree maximum temperature threshold.
He says there were a record 320 complaints filed with the Minnesota Department of Agriculture regarding dicamba off-target spray drift damage in 2021, which tops 240 in 2017. That prompted the task force to recommend changes.
Worth says they don’t want to lose use of dicamba because its an important product for weed control in soybeans, especially resistant weeds.
MDA plans to register four dicamba products for use with additional restrictions. Applications can’t be made if the air temperature is over 85-degrees. South of Interstate 94 there will be a June 12 cutoff and north of that line, a June 30 cutoff.
