A Seminar on Herbicide Drift has been scheduled on Nov. 3, 2012, at Southeast Community College, 301 So. 68th St., Lincoln. Herbicide drift has been a problem for America’s vineyards for decades. It arrests plant growth, may cause plant death, and often eliminates the crop. The early spring this year created conditions that exposed many northern states’ vineyards to high levels of damage and economic loss from 2,4-D.

The NWGGA has worked to bring together resources to help you understand the damage pesticide drift can cause in your vineyard and what resources you have available to you before, during and after a drift incident.

In this seminar, you will learn the history of harmful herbicides, how drift occurs, the visual symptoms of 2,4-D, glyphosate and dicamba injury and the harm they can do to grapes, how to mitigate the damage to rescue your plants, how to estimate your losses to a drift incident, how Driftwatch and similar programs work for you, how various state Departments of Agriculture Pesticide Investigation works and their objectives, examples of current and past investigations, differing statutes between states, what’s coming in the future – good and bad, your responsibilities when drift happens to you, and what your liability can become for the pesticides you spray in your vineyard. (Provided the technology can be brought together, this seminar may be available as a Northern Grapes Project web seminar to all cold climate state participants.)

This cooperative event is being provided by the Nebraska Winery and Grape Growers Association, University of Nebraska Viticulture program, and The Northern Grapes Project.

Registration is due by Oct. 26 and the fee for the on-site seminar is $20. Please make your check out to NWGGA and mail in care of: Cathleen Oslzly, P.O. Box 5502, Lincoln NE 68505, or call her for more details at 402-781-9213.