The 2023 Crop Protection magazine is free inside this Thursday's paper and it is a must-have item for tillage farmers for the season ahead.

Make sure to pick up your copy and keep it safe for the year ahead.

Check out what's inside below.

Product lists

You will need to keep this magazine safe throughout the year, as it will be a really handy reference for product names, PCS numbers, application rates and timings and will be very useful for record keeping.

Throughout the magazine, we have lists on available herbicides, fungicides, plant growth regulators and insecticides.

Varieties

We examine your varieties to see what their strengths and weaknesses are and you can then treat, or not treat, as appropriate.

Choosing disease-resistant varieties and varieties with good straw strength is a key part of integrated pest management.

The Department of Agriculture describes the work being done in its trials to find varieties suited to Irish conditions with good disease resistance and straw strength profiles, while also meeting grain quality requirements for different markets.

Growth stages

A quick guide to identifying growth stages is outlined on pages 18 to 20. Getting timings right on plant protection products and fertiliser is essential.

Mixing varieties

Cork researcher Aoife O’Driscoll, who is based in the UK, writes about the pros and cons of mixing varieties in the field. She shares some of the findings from research at NIAB.

Making money

Tom McCabe outlines how spend on crops should or shouldn't change as grain prices change.

Protecting chemistry

We have to continue to protect the chemistry that is available in the toolbox. Teagasc’s Steven Kildea has advice for farmers and advisers on how to prevent disease resistance.

Andy Doyle outlines where disease resistance levels are at on pages 40-41. He gives details from samples collected across Europe to test for resistance against the main cereal diseases.

Pests

VJ Baskar gives the latest information on controlling grass weeds in your tillage crops. He outlines how effective current chemistry is and what we should do to get the best control possible.

Bruchid beetle

As the area of beans increases across the country, researchers in Co Carlow want your help to examine the Bruchid beetle.