Canada Thistle Marathon

[Stocker Steve]

We have boom sprayed, spot sprayed, hoed, and pulled Canada thisle so far this year. The third crop of thistle is bolting now and the kids are losing interest. The good news is that one of the neighbors is feeling guilty enough to start spraying also. Most of our pasture is too rocky to mow and has too much clover to boom spray - - so I am thinking about using a wiper with Round up for a change of pace. Any other suggestions?

P.S. We burn any blooming thistle plants we pull. I have not seen them re root, but do oI think there is enough nutrients in the stem that the seeds can still become viable. Besides, I get a lot of satisfaction out of seeing them burn...

 

[Texas PaPaw]

Steve

Don't have any experience with canadian thistle but have used a rope wick several years ago on big pigweed & kochia weeds growing in sugarbeets. Didn't get very good control with straight roundup on the big weeds, however when I added Dicamba (Banvel) to the roundup & wicked every swath in both directions for better coverage it killed 2-3 ft tall weeds graveyard dead. I called it souped-up roundup. Just my 2 cents worth.

Good luck & happy trails.

Brock

 

[msscamp]

We have boom sprayed, spot sprayed, hoed, and pulled Canada thisle so far this year. The third crop of thisle is bolting now and the kids are losing interest. The good news is that one of the neighbors is feeling guilty enough to start spraying also. Most of our pasture is too rocky to mow and has too much clover to boom spray - - so I am thinking about using a wiper with Round up for a change of pace. Any other suggestions?

I've been fighting Canadian Thistle, Bindweed, Fox Tail, and Milkweed for the last 3 years - I hear you! For boom spraying, check into Cimarron - it's a new herbicide made especially for thistle and the hard to kill noxious weeds, but it won't kill clover like Round-Up will. The number is 1-800-6DUPONT, if memory serves. Hoeing and pulling won't do a thing unless you get all of the taproot. Mowing is not a good idea, either, because it just spreads pieces and parts of the thistle. Maybe I'm wrong on this, but I swear the pieces and parts can root. In areas that I can't spray (around little trees, etc.) I soak the ground really well, pull them and this year I've started disposing of the pulled up thistle rather than just letting them rot. I swear there is twice to three times as much thistle where I pulled the damn stuff and left it to rot last year. I generally spot spray with the sprayer set on a coarse setting to cut down on the drift using Round-Up (2 oz/gallon) and Tordon (I think it's 1 oz/gallon, but can't remember for sure). It kills it, but the spot spraying is a pain in the rear in the fields.

 

[bward]

The thing about Canada Thistle that is so maddening is that it being an invader, it will take over very healthy stands of grass. Its not just an opportunist that fills in overgrazed areas like most weeds it actively goes out there and infects perfectly good stands of thick grass. Anyway we have had some good results using Grazon. It keeps it under control for a few years at a time. I have also used roundup in the past, doing a lot of spot spraying and don't find it as effective. That is possibly because with grazon you spray everything and it only kills target plants wheras with Round up you are doing a lot of spot spraying and tend to miss a lot of the plants., while trying to preserve some grasses.

Its a hateful weed.

 

[msscamp]

The thing about Canada Thistle that is so maddening is that it being an invader, it will take over very healthy stands of grass. Its not just an opportunist that fills in overgrazed areas like most weeds it actively goes out there and infects perfectly good stands of thick grass. Anyway we have had some good results using Grazon. It keeps it under control for a few years at a time. I have also used roundup in the past, doing a lot of spot spraying and don't find it as effective. That is possibly because with grazon you spray everything and it only kills target plants wheras with Round up you are doing a lot of spot spraying and tend to miss a lot of the plants., while trying to preserve some grasses.

Its a hateful weed.

Isn't Grazon another name for 2-4D?

 

[KenB]

The thing about Canada Thistle that is so maddening is that it being an invader, it will take over very healthy stands of grass. Its not just an opportunist that fills in overgrazed areas like most weeds it actively goes out there and infects perfectly good stands of thick grass. Anyway we have had some good results using Grazon. It keeps it under control for a few years at a time. I have also used roundup in the past, doing a lot of spot spraying and don't find it as effective. That is possibly because with grazon you spray everything and it only kills target plants wheras with Round up you are doing a lot of spot spraying and tend to miss a lot of the plants., while trying to preserve some grasses.

Its a hateful weed.

Isn't Grazon another name for 2-4D?

Grazon P-D is 2-4D plus Picloram

 

[cfpinz]

I soak the ground really well, pull them and this year I've started disposing of the pulled up thistle rather than just letting them rot.

Yeah, that helps. But I get better results disposing of them after dark. That way the neighbor can't see me throw them over the fence to his side. 8)

cfpinz

 

[George Monk]

We use Crossbow at 1.5 qt/25 gal and 12 oz surfactant for spot spraying. with this combo thistles are dead in no time. I really don't worry about them any more because this is so effective. I usually run through the pastures in early June then again about now to get any I missed. We have very few compared to when the place was rented out to a lousy tenant who never sprayed or cut brush. After years of neglect I am getting them under control! May eliminate all in the next year or two,

 

[Susie David]

I guess that we have some strange Herfs...they love the stuff, will eat the leaves as soon as they can get a mouth on them. Once they get stalks we just chop them. Small pastures and it gives the son-in-law a chance to make me happy.
Did flatten a stand for a neighbor with the tractor and a blade.
Some 2-4d finished them off.
DMc

 

[Angus Guy]

You are fighting a losing battle trying to get canadian thistle now. Try spraying them in fall and then again in the spring at rozette. Grazon and Milestone both do a good job on them.

 

[somn]

Have you ever tried basagran. It is more expensive than other herbicides but it works the first time.

 

[joe]

best luck i have had is with 2-4D and tordon mix. and boom spray with the 4 wheeler

 

[Angus Guy]

joe

That is basicly what Grazon is. 2,4D + Tordon 42K

 

[msscamp]

I soak the ground really well, pull them and this year I've started disposing of the pulled up thistle rather than just letting them rot.

Yeah, that helps. But I get better results disposing of them after dark. That way the neighbor can't see me throw them over the fence to his side. 8)

cfpinz

:shock: :shock: :shock: That's cold!! :lol: :lol:

 

[IluvABbeef]

Every time there's thistle in the pasture, we use the loader of the tractor to back blade the thistle, nettles, etc. It works every time and takes less effort too. Had to back blade thistles in the neighbor's pen most every year, once a year in late spring to summer time. The neighbor's horses sure appreciated it and they went in there and trampled them down. Cattle will do the same, no doubt. We back blade them before they flower/go to seed, which explains why we didn't have as much as a problem with them these past couple of years.

 

[danl]

After reading that Susie David's cows eat Canadian thistle I did a search on what it looked like. Because I don't think what I been calling Canadian thistle is edible by anything.
So I think Ive been calling Bull thistle, Canadian thistle for years

 

[IluvABbeef]

I heard sometime ago that some cattle were trained to eat Canada thistle, I think it was sort of an experiment, if you can call it that. Some cows were put into a corral overgrown with Canada thistle, with a few patches here and there of grass. The cows ate the grass, but where reluctant to eat the thistle. They obviously went hungry for a little while, until one animal, out of desperation and hunger, started eating thistle. Well, you folks know how it goes with cattle, they see one do something, and pretty soon you got them all doing the same thing. That's how it went with those cows, and they were kept in until they had the thistle cleaned up pretty good. Then when they were let out to pasture that wasn't overgrown with the prickly stuff, but only found in patches here and there, those cows went straight to the thistle patches and started eating them before they even touched the grass! :shock: I think that same thing happened to Susie David's herfs, just only by mere accident.

 

[dun]

We had a couple of cows that would fight over them. One of those cows we sold and now the other doesn;t have any interest in them. But there are a couple of calves that eat them and really seem to like the flowers.

dun

 

[Susie David]

Seems like our herfs have a large capacity and I suppose that hand feeding them the tender leaves has helped the cows learned behavior...all-in-all it is a win-win situation for us.
DMc

 

[danl]

After reading this Sunday, I was inspired to mix up some round up and go after the bull thistle in my fields.


I sprayed about three gallons just walking across the field and getting each one at a time. Sure was hot I estimate the temperature was around 700 degrees!!

But the good thing is as, of yesterday they were really looking droopy turning black and looking generally sick.
So I guess I will go back this afternoon and try to find all the ones
I missed.
Dan