Low concentration glyphosate over chufas

I know for yellow nut grass I have to use a 4-5% glyphosate solution to do any good on it. So my question is this. Has anyone ever successfully used 2% glyphosate solution for controlling weeds in chufas and not hurt their chufas?

Glyphosate doesn’t seem to affect Chufa. I’ve sprayed some fields 3 times this year with full rate 32 Oz Roundup Pro with AMS and other corn/soybean herbicides. Chufa are thriving in corn and soybean stands. Only “weed” in fields

Thank you. That’s what I needed to know.

I'm just thinking out loud but I don't know if glypho has much effect on anything with a bulb or tuber. I have sprayed weeds in bulb type flower beds many times with no ill effect other than maybe a little yellowing of the younger plants when the mix was strong. I bet that if it kills glorified nut grass (chufa) that it is only on the surface and will immediately return from the root.

I repeat do NOT spray your chufa with gly at any rate. By using gly on your chufa patch you stand a very good chance of killing your chufa!

If you want to control grass spray it with Clethodim and for broadleaf use Milestone. It can be mixed together so you only have to make one pass.

I agree with Squeaky. I have tried doing what you are considering, and I think it might be possible to make it work if you could get the dosage just right. What I found was that chufa is FAR more susceptible to gly than yellow nutgrass. Nutgrass will take a heavy dose of gly and not be bothered a bit, but it will kill or damage chufas at pretty low rates.

I have notes on it somewhere, but I think I used 10 oz of gly per acre and that killed some chufas and turned others brown. No effect at all on the nutgrass at that rate. I have tried 4 quarts of gly per acre on nutgrass and didn't kill it. There is probably some rate that you could use that would kill most grass and weeds and not damage chufas, but that rate will vary from year to year depending on rain, and field to field depending on fertility. It is so expensive to grow them that I'd rather spend the money for the right chemicals. They really aren't that expensive.

But I am all for thinking outside the box and trying to find a more efficient way to do something. Please tell us about it if you try. Good luck

I still think I'm sitting on a gold mine. I have the most prolific sub species of nutsedge known to man in my garden. It will grow as thick as hair on a dogs back and the blades will reach 2 1/2 feet tall. It's got a nut on it as big as a big water oak acorn. I'm trying to kill it and should be selling it.

Eat one and you will find out instantly if it's any good. A yellow nutsedge tuber has a taste that is something like kerosene. There aren't many critters in the woods who will eat them. A chufa has a pleasing flavor that reminds me of almonds. They are grown for human food in Spain; I really don't know why it has never caught on here. Might be a marketing opportunity there for someone. Anyway, one bite and you will know.

The eggheads can't agree on whether chufa and yellow nutsedge is the same plant. Some say it is and some say it isn't. It will not cross, even when growing side by side, so I agree with those who say it isn't. And the plants don't look alike at all once they are 50-60 days old.

on my 40 ac here at the house I have areas in the field that have (had) it thick. Once the hogs find it they will almost eradicate it...it took about 3 complete rootings 3 years in a row but now there is just one that pops up here and there.

I don’t think you can kill Chufa with herbicide. Glyphosate definitely hasn’t affected mine. I’ve got two plots that are about an acre each that just won’t die. I’ve sprayed them with everything you can imagine and they are still thriving.

I've seen chufas damaged and even killed by a number of different herbicides. If you are trying to kill them and can't, I would think it's likely yellow nutsedge instead of chufas. Can you make a picture and post it?

Wish I could figure out how to post pics but y’all would get tired of me posting. I sprayed several fields couple weeks ago with 48 Oz Roundup Pro to plant green fields. Road by yesterday to see if fields were ready to plant. Looked like a dessert except for Chufa. They are thriving. Looks like I sprayed with the purpose of releasing Chufa. I’m not a turkey hunter. Someone gave me 2 bags of Turkey Gold a couple years ago and I planted them with my corn planter just to see what they would do. Apparently my soil is good for Chufa. I’ll plant small grain/clover mix right over them

Thanks for the reply. If you sprayed that much gly and they survived, then I feel sure that what you have growing is yellow nutsedge. I've found that it's almost impossible to kill yellow nutsedge with gly, but real easy to kill chufas. I tried the low volume gly over chufas many years ago and it killed or damaged them heavily. I have tried 4 quarts of gly and couldn't even bother the yellow nutsedge.

Many AL soils have yellow nutsedge present in them, and nothing stimulates it like growing chufas. So I have found that when I start growing chufas in a field, it is eventually taken over by yellow nutsedge. I have tried hand spraying the nutsedge in the chufa patch, but the only herbicides that will kill nutsedge will of course kill the chufas so it leaves bare spots in the field. The only real solution is to just move the field.

I suspect that you had a stand of dormant yellow nutsedge where you planted chufas and it has now taken over the field. But regardless of which plant it is, you can turn it under and grow your winter plots without issue. Good luck with it

Maybe one day I’ll figure out this pic thing. If it’s yellow nutsedge it came in a bag from NWTF and said Golden Chufa on it. Seed was about the size of dog food and it is growing in perfectly straight rows from the corn planter. I’m certainly not a Chufa guy and wish I hadn’t planted them. Have never seen a turkey use them

if the coons and turkeys aren't diggin them up, they aren't chufas that are coming back where you planted them, its sedge. promise you that's not what NWTF sent you because I get them every year and never had a problem

I’m 100% sure these are Chufa. Be glad to send you a pic to post. Can’t keep coons and turkeys out of corn fields here. If you will pm me your cell I’ll send you pic next time I go by field

Someone send me a cell # please so I can post my Chufa pics. Be glad when it stops raining so that I can do something other than post on Aldeer all day. We’ve got enough of a good thing

Amen. I'm going stir crazy

I sent you mine. Maybe we can solve the mystery

Here it is, but it's a single plant and it's honestly hard for me to say with any certainty which it is. It is growing alone without bunching which is a characteristic of yellow nutsedge. When they are really thick, chufas can look like this, but this one doesn't seem to be thick. It looks like I see some herbicide damage on it, which chufa would be more likely to show.

Here is a field of chufas made in August. Notice how the plants grow in bunches.

Additional pictures solve the mystery. It's yellow nutsedge. It was already in the soil and it took off when you worked it. You probably had some chufas growing there at first, but the nutgrass had taken over now. I can show you fields on my place where the same thing has happened, despite me fighting it best I can.

This is what chufas look like when pulled up. You can easily see the difference in the two plants when you pull them up.

image share

Riverwood sent me several more pics; here is the one I think looks the most like chufas:

It's really hard from that picture to say that they definitely are not chufas, but all the others and what you have posted make me believe that it's yellow nutsedge, or nutgrass as it's commonly called. Nutgrass produces tubers just as chufas do, but it is unusual for me to see as many as in the above pic. One thing is apparent - you have much better soil than I do. I can't even get nutgrass to look as healthy as those plants.

You say it's been 2 years since you planted the chufas. They will regenerate, but I have to work hard to get them to do it with a decent stand. If it's been 2 years and you haven't planted more, then all of my experience says you now have nutgrass. All the other pics look like nutgrass, and even the one above had such aggressive rhizomes that I would guess it to be nutgrass.

But there are people with advanced degrees who say they are the same plant anyway, so maybe I am wrong. Your original seed came from Spain, so who knows if it might have developed a gly tolerance over there? Still, I think you just have nutgrass if you have sprayed that much gly and it survived.

It's hard for me to repost your pics unless I save them multiple times. Go to postimage.org and you can post them all yourself. The key is to not register; just load the image and click on Hotlink for forums and you can post all that you want us to see

Here is one of the best pics I have to show the difference. The plant that is in the front is chufa. Note how it had bunched up. That is nutgrass in the background. Note that though the nutgrass is thick, it is just single stems. This growth characteristic is the easiest way to tell them apart in the field.



There are those who say they are the same plant. I don't think they are because they don't cross even when side by side. If they are the same species, it's only in the sense that a timber wolf and a poodle are the same species.

Note the herbicide damage to the chufas, while the nutgrass is healthy.

Here is a pic of a field of chufas from several years ago that was heavily damaged by 2,4-Db. I had sprayed it at 30 days with a quart per acre, and decided to hit it with another quart at 60. That turned out to be a real bad idea, but I got a lot of rain right after this and most of them recovered.

I've damaged chufas with many herbicides, but nutgrass is hard to hurt.

I can have turkeys using other food. I learned early in life after growing chufa that nutsedge will take over. My hats off to y'all that swear by them. I'll grow proso millet, sorghum and other small grains before I grow that invasive SOB again.

I've got no experience with chufas, but based off of yalls comments, do yall think there's any chance sedge nuts are being mixed in with chufa seeds?

Thanks for posting pics Preacher. Can someone please type a little bit slower and explain the pic posting again. I can get my pics downloaded to postimage and see share to forum and hot buttons but still can’t figure how to connect it to post here. Warning - if I ever figure this out y’all may grow tired of pictures of my bird dog, service dog, granddaughter, and tractors.

Upload to postimage
Copy the “direct link” text
Go to the picture icon on full editor
Delete what’s in that box already
Paste in your direct link
Click ok
Click post

You can do all that hydraulic work on a tractor and struggle to post a picture? I don't understand that. I know you have a bunch of pictures and I'd like to see them. It sounds like you have it almost done. When you click on Hotlink for forums it will tell you that it copied. Come to aldeer in the box where you are typing a reply and click there, then paste becomes an option. Click paste and you are done. When you add your text and then hit reply, the picture will appear.


Now tell me how to alter my hydraulics to use a lane shark.

I don't think there is any record of chufas crossing with nutgrass, but admittedly I read that on a pro chufa web site. I've never seen it myself. It's just that nutgrass is already in most fields and prepping the land for chufas turns it into ideal habitat for nutgrass. You could do everything except plant the chufas and the same thing would happen.

So do you have to type in the URL? Or is there somewhere to just click on image? That’s where I always get stuck. Thanks

[img]https://i.postimg.cc/z5xvnCQV/03_EA166_D-4052-48_EB-_A6_C0-_E9_D7_C938_CC94.jpg?dl=1[/img]

You don't have to type in the URL. Upload the image and then click on Hotlink for forums. It will tell you it copied if you did it right.

To paste, all you do is click in the reply box. This is the same place that you type your reply, so you know how to do that. Once you click in it, paste will appear as an option, and you click on paste and the URL appears.

A different method using a different link is posted above, but I think just pasting into the reply box is the easiest way.

Think it’s gonna take another rain out like we had last week for me to figure this out. Gotta get some tractor time in now and get fields planted

I'm topdressing tomorrow. Then planting 30 acres fescue for a customer Monday. Plenty of seat time ahead this week too

Good to see you on here Willy, can’t believe you’re planting chufa in that hog infested area you’re in! But, I always have good luck by getting the field ready to plant and letting everything sprout and then spraying with roundup before I plant. The planters stir up a little weed seed but a timely plowing will take out most of it. Of course, I’m primarily battling pusley and that stuffs worse than kudzu. I’m not aware of any pre-emergent that will work.

Yep. Chufas came up good but didn’t turn out quite like I’d hoped. I’ll try em again next season. Think they stayed too wet this summer.

You broadcasting or using a drill or planters?

I just broadcasted them
Had decent germination but way too much weed competition