Evaluating Stakeholder Perceptions on Palmer Amaranth Management in Georgia

Results:

Table 1. Descriptive statistics for each perspective (P1 and P2) based on survey questions.

^aValues for farm size and ownership represent those from farmers only. 
^bParticipants had 4 operation categories from which to choose: Row crops, pastured livestock, horticultural crops and timber crops. Least diverse to most diverse experience values range from 1 to 4.  
^cHigher values indicate greater perception of Palmer severity. 
^dHigher values indicate greater receptivity to conservation tillage practices. 
^eMean values calculated based on farmer and extension stakeholders only. Industry representatives not involved in state funded cover crop research and/or use (sample sizes, P1 [n = 11] and P2 [n = 7]) 

Table 2. Idealized Q-sort rankings for each statement card and perspective. Statement cards are presented in descending order relative to the inter-factor z-score variance. Differences between factors are indicated by “*” which represent thresholds of p < 0.01. Consensus and disagreement statement cards are separated by an empty row.  

Narrative descriptions of the two factors extracted from our analyses are presented as Perspective 1 and Perspective 2 below:

Perspective 1 (P1): “Right now, what I’m doing is working.” (n = 14),
Themes: techno-optimism, -dissonance, and the “management program” 
This perspective viewed agronomic efficiency and productivity as essential pathways to economic viability. Farming was seen as an increasingly challenging business where uncontrollable factors such as weather and market forces perpetuated a highly variable and stressful working environment. P1 comprised 83 percent of extension agents, 50 percent of farmers, and 60 percent of agrichemical consultants. Of the farmers who had been referred to us by extension for their lack of interest in cover crops, 83 percent ended up in P1.

Managing Palmer amaranth was seen as one of many management challenges. Herbicide-centric management and, when possible, HT crop-herbicide packages were considered to be the most practical, effective, and economical methods to control Palmer amaranth. P1 appears cognizant of the potential benefits of biological-cultural practices, such as cover crops, but displayed greater hesitancy toward adopting alternative practices given the potential for increased management complexity. P1 valued management simplicity and herbicide-centric approaches to weed management, regardless of potential pitfalls. Weed management was generally framed as a linear process. This was described by many as a “management program” where different herbicides had specific roles to accomplish, and were assembled in a logical order to balance effectiveness and cost. However, many in P1 also recognized the inherent challenges with herbicide-centric management, including human error and carelessness, but saw no viable alternatives, a perspective known as “techno-dissonance” (Dentzman et al. 2016). One participant mentioned that, “Somebody’s going to screw it up and start using a lower rate. That’s what worries the tar out of me is they’re going to start building resistance”, while another added that, “Everything evolves, everything changes, you know. We know that no matter how good a herbicide is now, that it is only going to last so long. We can protect it with management - try to extend its life…but eventually how long will it last?” 

P1 expressed mixed receptivity to cover crops. While recognizing the benefits of cover crops in suppressing Palmer amaranth, and those related to soil conservation, participants from P1 also made clear that, “there's also expenses associated with it.” Despite being ranked similarly, conservation tillage practices were seen as somewhat important, with participants stressing gains in fuel and labor efficiency, as much if not more than any potential improvements to weed management. Tillage, while placed in a neutral column, was considered an important option under worst-case scenarios such as herbicide resistant Palmer amaranth. Said one participant in P1, “When Roundup started failing us, we had to go back to the old, traditional plowing.” 

Others mentioned an overall belief in the ongoing ability of both scientists to develop new products and Land Grant-based weed scientists to verify their efficacy, “I know how much science and research goes into developing a new product and it's tested by our specialists. If UGA backs it, then it's got to be a good product and they're having to constantly come up with new things, because there is so much resistance.”  

P1 participants spoke at greater length about spray equipment, herbicide types and herbicide management approaches, information which was readily available and shared among stakeholders on a regular basis through workshops, field days and one-on-one interactions. Given the potential for legal or financial challenges, participants were equally cognizant of externalities such as herbicide resistance and potential off-site movement of herbicides that could damage non-target crops. 

Perspective 2 (P2): "Some cover is good, more is better. Some tillage is bad, more is worse.” (n = 9) 
Themes: techno-skepticism and cover crop multifunctionality 
In contrast to P1, participants in P2 viewed the synergistic use of conservation tillage and cover crops as the pathway to agronomic and economic success. P2 participants spoke about the use of herbicide, but had an interest in reducing or complementing this with the practices mentioned above. While diversification strategies were viewed through agronomic and economic lenses, for some participants in P2, they were also seen through moral and aesthetic lenses. P2 comprised 17 percent of extension, 50 percent farmers and 40 percent of the agrichemical consultants. Eighty-three percent of farmers identified as “cover crop farmers” by extension ended up in P2.

Dealing with Palmer amaranth was seen as one of several emergent, beneficial properties of a farming system focused on tillage reduction and cover crop implementation. Many participants from P2 expressed as much—with one saying, “I don’t really know how to separate my using conservation tillage from the cover crops.” There was also more discussion around intensive cover crop management; said one participant, “We're taking care of our cover crop, treating it like a cash crop. We're able to get a ton of biomass…we're not giving the pigweed anywhere to go, anywhere to grow.” P2 participants viewed newer crop-herbicides packages as simply one practice, among many, to help manage Palmer amaranth. As one participant put it, “I think they're useful. I don’t think they're essential. I don’t think we have to rely on the auxin herbicides for good control. They're another good tool.”

Statement cards related to tillage were among the most negatively placed, as these strategies could negatively impact the soil-based improvements that participants felt they had made over a long period of conservation tillage implementation.

P2 participants recognized the importance of chemical-technological approaches, but questioned the extent to which they should be relied upon (techno-skepticism). In particular, the use of auxin herbicides (2,4-D and Dicamba) and crops engineered with resistance to them were viewed as something to be used infrequently, if at all. Some mentioned that these herbicides were, “…not to be used as your primary - you ought to have it under control before you have to use that.” This techno-skepticism was associated with a different notion of weed management. One participant put it this way, “I'll tell you that going forward, I don’t think chemistry is going to be the answer…I think biological control of weeds is going to by far outweigh chemical/transgenic applications, because essentially, we’re dangerously close to running out of new chemistry.”  

For many in P2, cover crop use began as a remedy for a singular management challenge. One participant mentioned that, “Resistant weed management was definitely a focal point in my passion to implement cover crops.” However, participants shared that the multifunctionality of this practice was key to its continued use. One participant clearly framed this idea when talking about early experimentation with a specific cover crop species: “I found out inadvertently early on…that tropical legume sunn hemp from a clean start, a dead start, will outgrow and suppress the pigweed all by itself. At 60 days the cover crop will be eight feet tall and the pigweed, if a pigweed emerged and started to grow with it, would be completely shaded out, would never make seed, and never reproduce. In the same time frame you've already made 150 plus units of nitrogen with that Sun Hemp, so boy where’s the loss in this equation. Weed suppression, complete suppression of resistant Palmer and 150 pounds of nitrogen, that opened my eyes pretty big.”  

The notion of the multifunctionality of cover crops extended beyond the agronomic or economic benefits into areas of family and rural livelihood, environmental stewardship, and even aesthetics. One participant shared that cover cropping was, “the best thing for the family farm, the best thing for the environment, the best thing for the family and the community” and followed this by saying: “I love to see my children out picking flowers in a field or picking peas in a field of a cover crop …taking them to their grandparents, it’s a thing of beauty.”  Yet another framed management practices in an almost moral light, “I take pride in being a good steward…it's an opportunity or privilege to do something good for the world by the way I farm.” 

Points of convergence:
Participants from both perspectives spoke about how essential crop rotation and the use of diverse herbicide MOA and tank mixes were for managing Palmer and staving off herbicide resistance. Participants across both perspectives were skeptical about the effectiveness of regulation in limiting “bad behavior” and incentivization in motivating adoption of biological-cultural practices, such as cover crops. While herbicide resistance and Palmer amaranth management were described in serious terms by all participants, there was a general view that these phenomena arose from individuals seeking to cut costs and “cut corners.” Despite this, most participants shared the belief that regulatory efforts geared toward limitations on the use of certain herbicides were an ill-conceived, one-size-fits-all approach that would both reduce farmers’ options for managing this weed and fail to account for farm-specific contextualities. Lastly, many participants commented on the idea of “path dependence or “lock-in.” Path dependence can be understood as a phenomenon by which a specific technology receives continual investment and dynamic returns over time, becoming self-reinforcing and essentially “locking out” any potential alternative technology, even if an alternative would provide potentially superior results or reduce risk.

Discussion:

The management and ideological orientations expressed (to a greater extent in P1, but evident in both perspectives) are representative of the dominant paradigm for weed management in both Georgia and the US. Even discussions around IWM practices were framed within the confines of an herbicide-centric paradigm. For example, while both perspectives highlighted the importance of crop rotation, much of this centered on its role in allowing for the use of a more diverse suite of herbicides. More so, even the notion of diversity was often limited to the inclusion of two rather than just one crop in a rotation—as is the case in Georgia, where diversification in the majority of agricultural land devoted to the production of cotton describes the addition of peanut as a crop rotation partner. While cover crops were the IWM practice most discussed and used by both perspectives, they were only present on approximately 12 percent of harvested cropland in the state as recently as 2017. Other IWM practices represented within our statement cards, such as the use of insects or fungi for biocontrol of Palmer amaranth, are presently under-developed or researched, and almost non-existent within contemporary cropping systems in the state. The reality of IWM practices on the ground is that few are implemented and, those that are, are sparsely practiced.

Given the systemic challenges associated with the transition to IWM systems, and described by the participants from each perspective, we call attention to the role of policy governing the use of cover crops, specifically. Meta-analyses in both the Midwest and Southeast have consistently shown that cover crop biomass quantity strongly correlated with weed suppression, which is directly tied to earlier planting and later termination dates (Nichols et al. 2020; Weisberger et al. 2022) Additionally, having a reasonable base cost-share payment for those who may not be ready from either a structural or even personal level to optimize cover crop biomass may help retain farmers who might otherwise opt out of these programs after the expiration of the funding period (Wardropper et al. 2022).

While the two perspectives which emerged from our study are not an exhaustive representation of perspectives on integrated approaches to weed management, they do correspond to similar observations within the literature. For example, Dentzman and Jussaume (2017) commented on the association between a farming ideology based on constant vigilance of time/labor demands and production efficiency and a decreased appetite for IWM practices. This same ideology has been associated with increased techno-optimism and -dissonance, suggesting that stakeholders involved in perpetuating this model may struggle to believe in the possibility of alternative weed management systems, whether or not they have faith in the possibility or new chemical-technological advancements (Dentzman et al. 2016; Dentzman and Jussaume, 2017; Jussaume et al. 2019; Jussaume et al. 2021). Conversely, prior work on stakeholders with a strong interest in cover crops, conservation tillage, and a desire to further diversify cropping systems has shown strong evidence for a “systems-thinking” mentality that ascribes myriad agri-environmental and social benefits to the adoption of these practices (Arbuckle and Roesch-McNally, 2015; Rosenzweig et al. 2019; Church et al. 2020). More recently, the agronomic practices mentioned above have been identified under the rubric of “Regenerative Agriculture”, which purports benefits of this systems-level approach, and is highly disinclined to implement even strategic tillage operations (Dentzman and Burke, 2021; Giller et al. 2021).