Volunteer chickpeas
Controlling volunteer chickpeas is important to prevent disease carryover to future chickpea crops. Ascochyta is the main disease focus but others include botrytis grey mould, sclerotinia, phoma blight, pythium, fusarium and rhizoctonia. Ascochyta and grey mould can carry from one season to the next on infected stubble, infected seed or volunteer plants. It is recommended that chickpeas be grown at least four seasons apart.
Description
Chickpeas are a high-quality annual legume that grow between 250-500 mm tall with pea-like flowers and pods. Most volunteer chickpeas will germinate in the following season as they have little dormancy. The emerging leaves of desi-type chickpeas have triangular, toothed stipules and 5-6 pairs of leaflets which often have red edges. Kabuli-types have oval, slightly toothed stipules and 6-7 pairs of leaflets which don’t have red edges.Control
As chickpeas can be very fast growing, particularly in summer, aim to control any germinating volunteers early. Volunteer chickpeas that emerge in winter cereals can be controlled with post emergent selective herbicides. Consider the required plant back periods of residual Group B and Group I herbicides, particularly if a short chickpea rotation is planned.Velocity®; is registered for post emergent suppression of 2-6 leaf volunteer chickpeas in wheat, barley, cereal rye and triticale.®Velocity will supress the growth of chickpeas but may not adequately reduce plant numbers. Precept® is registered for the control of 2 leaf - 5 node volunteer chickpeas when used in a tank mix with Lontrel®; in wheat, barley, oats, cereal rye and triticale.
Roundup Ready® with PLANTSHIELD® and Roundup Ready PL are both registered for the control of volunteer chickpeas in Roundup Ready and TruFlex® canola varieties.
References
GRDC (2017), ‘GRDC Grownotes: Chickpea, Southern’, https://grdc.com.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0022/301639/GRDC-GrowNotes-chickpea-Southern-region.pdf
Herbiguide (2014), ‘Chickpea’, http://www.herbiguide.com.au/Descriptions/hg_Chickpea.htm
Pulse Australia (2015), ‘Chickpea: Integrated Disease Management’, http://www.pulseaus.com.au/growing-pulses/bmp/chickpea/idm-strategies