The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has grated full registrations (Section 3) recently for several fungicides that are important to wheat and barley production.  The active ingredients metconazole and tebuconazole have passed EPA’s scrutiny and will be marketed either as stand-alone or as premixed products. 

On April 21, 2008, EPA granted section 3 labels for two new BASF fungicides containing the active ingredient, metconazole. Caramba is straight metconazole (8.6 % a.i.) and Multiva is a premix of Caramba (7.4% metconazole) and Headline (12% pyraclostrobin). The final labels for these products are not yet available through the common agrochemical internet resources such as:

    CDMS site      http://www.cdms.net/LabelsMsds/LMDefault.aspx
    Greenbook     http://www.greenbook.net/
    BASF             http://www.agproducts.basf.com/

On May 2, Bayer announced that Folicur was granted a supplemental label to its existing section 3 label, which allows for application to wheat and barley in most wheat producing states. Prior to this, states had previously applied for and received approval for the use of Folicur on small grains through the Section 18 process. With this decision, the section 3 Folicur label for peanuts and some grasses has been expanded to include wheat and barley. The Folicur labels are available electronically. Another tebuconazole fungicide, Orius 4F, is expected to be amended to allow similar crop uses.

The full registration of Folicur 4F for use in wheat and barley (Folicur 4F already had full registrations for use in peanuts and grass seed production in some States) is very good news as it not only will allow access to Folicur in 2008 but it opens up the possibility of tank mixing Proline and Folicur (the so-called ‘3+3’ for which a 2ee recommendation was in place in 2007). This is important because Proline is not as strong against cereal rust diseases. This weakness is taken care of by adding Folicur, which is excellent against rusts. Relevant Folicur labels that are available electronically through the internet can be found at:

     Folicur 3.6 F Federal Section 3 label
           http://www.cdms.net/LDat/ld6AK011.pdf