Malathion Use in Seed Corn in Hawaii
Teung,
Thanks for asking.
In Hawaii both are used. For large fields ("Parent seed fields") where there's 1 female and 1 male, gowers would use a cutter and then a wheel puller. That procedure gets anywhere fron 70 to 95 % of the tassels. After that, a field crew would either walk or drive through and pull the rest.
In smaller ISO plots, there are many females to 1 male and these are used to produce seed for hybrid testing, the normal procedure is hand pulling because there's no uniformity in tasselling, plant height and other variables.
If you have any questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to contact either Mike Kawate (mike@hpirs.stjohn.hawaii.edu, 808/956-6008) or me.
Mahalo,
Cathy
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On 30 Oct 2006 at 13:50, Teung.F.Chin@aphis.usda.gov wrote:
I was discussing the need for a 12 hour REI for seed corn detasseling in Hawaii. Some colleagues thought that it is now done by mechanical equipment. The 3 day REI that EPA is recommending is based on hand detasseling.
So my question is, are your seed corn growers using mechanical means to detassel or hands? Or perhaps both? Hands for small plots? thanks!
Teung
