RECOMMENDATIONS FOR SWEET BRIER CONTROL

Press, Volume XCIX, Issue 29383, 9 December 1960, Page 20

RECOMMENDATIONS FOR SWEET BRIER CONTROL

Land owners whose properties here been invaded-by sweet brier would be well advised to take immediate action to control it, accordihg to the Department of Agriculture.

Improvable grassland threatened by sweet brier should be oversown and topdressed, or the competitive ground cover otherwise improved. Grazing control should be used. Brier seedlings should be grubbed out immediately they appear. Seedlings and scattered small plants already occurring should preferably be grubbed or alternatively spot sprayed with a 2.4,5-T-diesel oil mixture. Whenever possible this treatment should be followed up by improvement of ground cover and controlled grazing. Scattered plants too big to grub should be pulled mechanically dr treated basally with 2,4,5-T spray

or fenuron pellets. Relatively large, firmly established stands and readily accessible individual plants should be sprayed basally with the 2.4.5-T--diesel oil mixture. Plants which form*thickets rather than distinct and separate crowns should be treated with fenuron pellets instead of spray. Surface growth.

which will interfere with basal treatment, should be removed by grazing or burning before chemicals are. used.

Strongly established infestations difficult to penetrate should be burnt off or opened up with a light 2.4,5-T aerial spray in summer. This should be followed in winter by a basal spray or in spring by a pellet dressing, according to the general nature of the plants.

For accessible waste places or exceptionally large plants or

thickets bulldozing er mechanical rooting, with subsequent chemical treatment of reviving {Hants, should be effective. For rugged, inaccessible areas where aerial application only is feasible fenuron pellets can be used. Seed dispersal from such areas can be prevented by a midsummer aerial application of T in fuel oil every second or third year. Ne Case of Disease.—An official of the Meat Packers Council of Canada said there had been no known case of foot and mouth disease in Catrnda recently. The official (Mr K. Graydon) was commenting on a report from Britain that the disease had spread throughout the country in the last month, the Canadian Press reported.—(Toronto, December 5) Temperament in an opera singer is merely the reaction from the stimulus of too much music.—Dr. Charles Mayo.