There are currently three herbicides registered for the control of littleseed canarygrass in the desert southwest. Hoelon was used with marginal success from 1982 to 1999. In 1999, Achieve was registered in Arizona and Puma was registered in California for the control of this weed in wheat and barley. Both have produced good to excellent levels of control (75 to 95 percent) in our tests and under commercial conditions. Two newer herbicides, Olympus (formerly Bayer MKH6561) and F130060 (Aventis) are being developed and have produced excellent levels of canarygrass control in our tests with less crop safety.

The 2003 study was a follow up of the 2001 and 2002 studies, but the major differences were the selection of a high quality durum wheat with values significantly higher that those seen in the previous two studies and the untreated check was eliminated and a higher level of phosphorous was applied. Treatments applied were 100, 200, 400 and 600 pounds of 16-20-0 planted with the seed through the grain drill. Phosphorus applied at planting improved yields with increasing application rates. In this study, the highest rate of application of phosphorus produced the highest profit.

The AZSCHED irrigation scheduling software was developed in the early 1990's to be used in a DOS environment on computers (1). Since it’s development it has been extensively used for irrigation scheduling on the Safford Agricultural Center. Changes in computer systems from DOS to Windows has made it imperative that a new Windows version of AZSCHED be developed. That version has been developed and is now in use at our location (2). This report covers the use of this software in scheduling irrigation for barley and wheat.

Nine herbicide treatments were evaluated for the control of mature nettleleaf goosefoot in durum wheat that was ten days from harvest. The only effective treatments were combinations of Glyphosate (Roundup Ultra Max and Touchdown) and Paraquat (Gramoxone). Applications of Aim, Gramoxone, and Glyphosate alone were ineffective.

Fourteen herbicide treatments were evaluated for the control of littleseed canarygras in durum wheat. Hoelon produced marginal (65%) control, Achieve fair (77%), Control and Puma good (92%) control. Tank mixes of Achieve and Puma with MCPA and Aim resulted in reduced canarygrass control. New ALS inhibitors, Olympus and F130060, produced good to excellent (85 to 95%) control except when mixed with crop oil concentrate and liquid nitrogen.

Small grain varieties are evaluated each year by University of Arizona personnel. The purpose of these tests is to characterize varieties in terms of yield and other attributes. Variety performance varies greatly from year to year and several site-years are necessary to adequately characterize the yield potential of a variety. A summary of small grain variety trials conducted by the University of Arizona can be found online at http://ag.arizona.edu/pubs/crops/az1265.pdf.

Small plot replicate trials were established to test seventeen durum wheat varieties. This year the study was looking at quality issues as well as yield, to verify which varieties were high enough quality for high dollar export. Duraking, a variety from World Wide Wheat, was the leading variety, with a yield over 5500 pounds per acre. A four year summary of yields and percent protein is also provided in this paper.

The purpose of this research was to determine which durum growth stage is most responsive to additional irrigations (based on 35% depletion) when grown at a slightly suboptimal irrigation level of 65% plant available soil water depletion at other growth stages. A field experiment was conducted at the Maricopa Agricultural Center testing the effects of additional irrigations applied during tillering, jointing, or grain fill. Additional irrigations during tillering, jointing, grain fill, or no additional irrigations resulted in grain yields of 5964, 5419, 6301, and 4200 lbs/acre for Kronos and 5440, 5990, 5030, and 4019 lbs/acre for Westbred 881, respectively. The most responsive stage to additional irrigation was grain fill for Kronos and jointing for Westbred 881. The yield response of Kronos to additional irrigation during jointing may have been reduced by severe (78%) lodging in this treatment.

Small plot replicate trials were established to test thirteen durum wheat varieties, four varieties of bread/feed wheat and six varieties of barley. Platinum, from World Wide Wheat, was the leading durum wheat variety with a yield of 3496 pounds per acre and YU 995-241, from Western Plant Breeders, the highest yielding bread/feed wheat variety with 5546 pounds per acre. #3 was the highest yielding barley variety with a yield of 6353 pounds per acre.

The last irrigation of wheat can be applied at the soft dough stage or for a sandy loam soil according to crop water use calculations. The purpose of this study is to verify at what stage the last irrigation of wheat should be applied. Studies were conducted on 7 commercial fields where the last irrigation was applied at the soft dough stage or about 10 to 14 days after soft dough. Applying the final irrigation after the soft dough stage does not appear to increase yield on average according to the results of this study.