What should I do if I have Waterhemp Escapes in Sugarbeet?

This page was adapted from the article, "What should I do if I have Waterhemp Escapes in Sugarbeet?" which appeared in Crop & Pest Report on June 2, 2022. 

Producers are mailing images of waterhemp escapes in sugarbeet. This pigweed is very small now, but it is clearly waterhemp. What are options for control?

You must act now. Small waterhemp grow very quickly and become large waterhemp, further reducing control options and interfering with sugarbeet root yield. I have stated for years that Stinger (clopyralid) does not control waterhemp. STINGER DOES NOT CONTROL WATERHEMP. However, we observed some evidence of Stinger helping waterhemp control from glyphosate in the Moorhead factory district in 2020. Fields were sprayed with ethofumesate PRE and followed by PowerMax + etho + Stinger EPOST. We repeated the treatment in the greenhouse and observed similar activity from Stinger mixtures with PowerMax and ethofumesate on small waterhemp.

Stinger mixed with PowerMax improved control of waterhemp which was less than 1-inch tall, by 20% and 26%, 12 and 25 DAT, respectively (Figure 1). The advantage was much reduced once waterhemp reached 1- to 2-inch tall, only improving control by 5% and 14%, 12 and 25 DAT.