Concerns over environmental and human health impacts of conventional weed management practices, herbicide resistance in weeds, and rising costs of crop production and protection have led agricultural producers and scientists in many countries to seek strategies that take greater advantage of ecological processes and thereby allow a reduction in herbicide use. This book provides principles and practices for ecologically based weed management in a wide range of temperate and tropical farming systems. After examining weed life histories and processes determining the assembly of weed communities, the authors describe how tillage and cultivation practices, manipulations of soil conditions, competitive cultivars, crop diversification, grazing livestock, arthropod and microbial biocontrol agents, and other factors can be used to reduce weed germination, growth, competitive ability, reproduction and dispersal. Special attention is given to the evolutionary challenges that weeds pose and the roles that farmers can play in the development of new weed-management strategies.

‘… this is an excellent book that was long overdue …’

Douglas D. Buhler Source: Crop Science

‘… a welcome addition to the weed science literature.’

Charlie R. Riches Source: Annals of Botany

'… it reads very well. The book's eleven chapters flow smoothly … This text would be appropriate for an advanced course or seminar; it is an important piece from which to draw the next generation of all crop protection professionals, not just week scientists. Furthermore, the approaches presented here should be the basis for future weed science textbooks. I laud the authors for their balanced - not shrill - call for a philosophical shift in how we view and sustainably manage pests in agroecosystems.'

Source: American Entomologist