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A new spray nozzle, purpose-designed to boost control of the UK's growing black-grass problem is now available to UK growers courtesy of Syngenta Crop Protection, following successful laboratory and field tests.

The new 'Hawk' Nozzle has been developed by Syngenta with Silsoe Research Institute and Hypro EU Ltd. for use with the herbicide 'Hawk'. It increases the amount of spray deposited on vertical black-grass at its vulnerable 1-2 leaf stage by producing a novel, forward-facing spray – thereby treating the weed from the side, rather than just above, and increasing the target area for the spray to hit.

Because black-grass is such a difficult and prolific weed, it is vital growers squeeze every last percent of control that they can. As well as correct cultural techniques and product choice, herbicides must be applied at the right weed growth stage and in the right way.

Laboratory tests at Silsoe revealed such angling more than doubled the amount of spray deposited on two-leaf black-grass compared with a vertical variable pressure nozzle, with field testing confirming a control boost from 97 to 99 percent when a prototype of the new nozzle was used to apply 'Hawk'.

The new nozzle is available from leading distributors and from a freephone orderline.

An innovative, new potato size grading tool and haulm destruction support pack from Syngenta is available to UK growers. The tool and pack are designed to help growers select the optimum time for crop desiccation with the herbicide 'Reglone', to ensure their potatoes are ready for harvest.

A series of size grids enable growers to quickly and accurately evaluate the proportion of tubers in a test dig that fall within different contract price bands.

This new device is another example of the company offering useful services to growers. The innovative tool has also attracted attention from growers in other countries.

Flagon from New Farm Crops, the cereal-breeding arm of Syngenta Seeds, is already the highest yielding winter malting barley on the HGCA Recommended List 2005/06, with a UK treated yield of 102 percent of control varieties.

This latest accolade indicates that the variety has shown the levels of malting quality that end users require. With growers now deciding which varieties to grow for next season, the combination of this approval, together with the step forward in yield that Flagon offers, should give farmers even greater confidence to plant the variety this autumn.

Successful malting varieties normally only progress to Provisional 1 approval in their first year of IOB listing, before achieving Full approval subject to further industrial tests. Flagon was able to progress straight to Provisional 2 approval because, as well as passing all the tests required for Provisional 1 listing, it had also passed many of those required for Full Approval. Subject to passing the remaining tests, we are hopeful of the variety achieving Full approval next June (2006).