A common pest on the Prairies will soon face a new insecticide seed treatment for canola
Staff Writer
Farms.com
Canola growers across Western Canada will have another option to protect their crops against flea beetles.
On May 19, Bayer announced the launch of BUTEO start, an insecticide seed treatment that protects the canola plant from flea beetles.
“What this product does is, it's on the seed as a seed treatment and then as the plant grows up and out of the ground, this is moved throughout the plant,” said Andrew Chisholm, trait and trait launch manager with Bayer.
The product works on both striped and crucifer flea beetles – pests that can cause up to 10 per cent yield loss in canola, said Chisholm.
“Every year, we have flea beetles and growers need to make decisions on how much damage the flea beetles are doing out in their field, especially when they're trying to get a lot of other work done on their farm. And really what this (product) does is help to create that strong plant right off the bat and give you that extra protection against flea beetles – especially the striped, which is starting to become more prevalent in more areas of Western Canada,” Chisholm told Farms.com.
This year, the product is in marketing development trials with the hope to have it launch commercially next year, said Chisholm.
“There's going to be more info coming out over the next few months on BUTEO start,” he said. “We're really excited to have growers see it and kind of experience some trials again this year and look forward to the future of growers being able to use it.”
Liudmyla Liudmyla/iStock/Getty Images Plus photo