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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Burns, Oregon » Range and Meadow Forage Management Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #407582
Research Project: Restoration and Conservation of Great Basin Ecosystems

Location: Range and Meadow Forage Management Research

Title: Evaluating performance of three types of carbon seed coatings on seedling development

Author
item DUQUETTE, CAMERON - The Nature Conservancy
item Rios, Roxanne
item BAUGHMAN, OWEN - The Nature Conservancy
item KILDISHEVA, OLGA - The Nature Conservancy
item CAHILL, MATT - The Nature Conservancy
item Boyd, Chad

Submitted to: Restoration Ecology
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 1/25/2024
Publication Date: 2/20/2024
Citation: Duquette, C., Rios, R.C., Baughman, O., Kildisheva, O., Cahill, M., Boyd, C.S. 2024. Evaluating performance of three types of carbon seed coatings on seedling development. Restoration Ecology. Article e14118. https://doi.org/10.1111/rec.14118.
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/rec.14118

Interpretive Summary: Multi-year pre-emergent herbicides are an option for control of invasive annual grasses in sagebrush ecosystems, but also prevent germination of concurrently-seeded native perennial grass species. In this study, we evaluated the efficacy of traditional herbicide protection pods (HPPs) versus smaller commercial coatings for protecting native seed from the pre-emergent herbicide imazapic and tested to see if the order of seeding and spraying affects the efficacy of high carbon industrial coatings and HPP technologies. We found no difference in effectiveness of seed coatings based on timing of herbicide application and, though no technology achieved complete protection, commercial seed coatings were able to achieve results comparable to HPPs with roughly 60% less activated carbon and 80% less dry materials. This smaller size is expected to reduce cost and simplify logistics of handling, storage, and delivery of carbon-coated seeds at management scales.

Technical Abstract: Sagebrush Steppe native plant restoration faces many hurdles to success, including extreme temperature and precipitation variability and non-native plant invasions. Multi-year preemergent herbicides are an option for annual grass control, but also prevent germination of native seeded species. Seed enhancement technologies have been recently developed and tested to shield native seeds from herbicide effects using activated carbon, giving them a competition-free window to germinate and develop. Several issues need to be addressed to scale these technologies appropriately to contend with the massive spatial extent of sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata spp.) steppe restoration needs, such as the ability to produce seed enhancement technologies at high volume and making them compatible with existing rangeland seeding practices. In this lab study, we evaluated the efficacy of traditional herbicide protection pellets (HPPs) versus smaller commercial coatings at protecting native seed from the preemergent herbicide imazapic. We then tested house-made coatings against those produced by Germains Seed Technology. Finally, we tested to see if the order of seeding and spraying affects the efficacy of high carbon industrial coatings and HPP technologies. Though no technology achieved complete protection, commercial seed coatings were able to achieve results comparable to HPPs with roughly 60% less activated carbon and 80% less dry materials; this smaller size is expected to reduce cost and simplify logistics of handling, storage, and delivery at scale. We also found no difference in the effectiveness of commercial seed coatings whether seeding happened before, or after spraying.