Dicamba-tolerant soybeans pose a dilemma for farmers, ag­­ronomists and weed scientists as they look ahead to the 2018 growing season.

“I feel like as an agronomist, we’re going to need this technology to combat waterhemp and Palmer amaranth,” said Jay Magnussen, an agronomist and farmer from Paullina.

But, he added, “I don’t want to spend the entire summer next year walking fields and having hard feelings between neighbors.”

That was the story of the summer of 2017 for Magnussen and many other agronomists.

Weed control in the Roundup Ready 2 Xtend soybeans, which are tolerant to glyphosate and dicamba herbicides, was excellent, Magnussen said on a DTN webinar regarding the dicamba situation. But he also saw some problems, even when the soybeans were sprayed according to label directions with new low-volatility dicamba formulations designed to reduce off-target movement.

He cited one example of a field sprayed when the wind was blowing away from a neighboring field of non-tolerant soybeans and other all conditions were within the label ...