Agaveville

2 Control stratagies
Many management strategies have been tried against Orobanche ramosa and other broomrapes, but few of them have proved reliable and these are only economical in high value agriculture.

The strength of branched broomrape lies in its ability to form a bank of seeds in the soil. A management or eradication program must aim at reducing this seed bank, while minimising the production of new seeds and their dispersal to new sites. Quarantine is therefore an essential element in control or eradication programs.

A simulation model (Kebreab & Murdoch, 2001) predicted that sustainable control of Orobanche spp. requires permanently a permanent reduction of the seed bank to below 2000 seeds per square metre. Cultural control techniques, applied individually in their model, needed to be highly effective to achieve this reduction; integrated control using several techniques including those aimed at reducing seed recruitment was therefore recommended.

In-crop control of Orobanche also requires an integrated strategy. Linke & Saxena (1991b) recommended a combination of solarisation, herbicides and hand weeding with careful choice of cultivars and sowing times to manage Orobanche in legume crops; none of these methods gave complete control when used separately.

GeeS wrote:I was checking the side of my house the other day, and was surprised to find two very large depressions. It appears that Javalinas discovered broomrape blooms and found them completely delicious! So it might very well be that the parasitic plants are now gone from my property. Fingers crossed.

Arizona Girl wrote:I first saw this species up Mount Lemmon going down the Oracle Ridge trail. It was the month of August I believe. Turns out there are herbarium records for this area, but the plant seems to occur at many different elevations. I'd love it if it popped up in my yard. I do have Hymenoclea (burro bush) in my yard which one reference said it was associated with. Not sure if they meant it was a host or not.