Mepiquat Formulation Evaluation in southeastern Arizona

Abstract

A series of experiments were conducted in 2003 in the Upper Gila River Valley in Safford, AZ to evaluate several different formulations of the plant growth regulator (PGR) Pix manufactured by BASF. Two experiments were conducted at the Safford Agricultural Center (SAC) while the third was conducted on a grower-cooperator field in the same valley. Experiments conducted at SAC involved evaluating the four formulations of Pix (Pix, Pix Plus, Pix Ultra, and Pentia) in a standard (STD) treatment regime and a low rate multiple (LRM) regime. The untreated control plots in both the LRM and STD experiments produced higher yields than any of the other PGR formulations. Comparing only the PGR formulation treatments the Pentia treatment produced the highest yield in both the STD and LRM experiments. No significant differences were observed in fiber quality for either the LRM or STD experiment. The third experiment conducted on a growercooperator field was a Pentia demonstration experiment. Three treatments including a control, a standard, single Pentia application, and an aggressive split application of Pentia were employed. The highest yield was produced in the most aggressive Pentia treatment. Results from this set of experiments demonstrate the importance of incorporating information from plant monitoring techniques when making decisions about PGR applications.