Antagonism and Synergism Between Herbicides: Trends from Previous Studies

Abstract

A synthetic data set was created by incorporating results from previously published papers on antagonistic and synergistic herbicide interactions between two herbicides applied as a tank mixture or sequentially, and then analyzed on the basis of various properties of the herbicides and target plants. Generally, interactions between herbicides were antagonistic more frequently than synergistic. This trend held no matter whether the interacting herbicides were absorbed by the same or different parts of the plant, had the same or different translocating abilities, had the same or different modes of action, and regardless of whether the target plants were annual or perennial plants, or crops or weeds. Antagonistic interactions occurred much more frequently when the target plants were monocot than dicot, and in the Compositae, Gramineae, or Leguminosae than in the Chenopodiaceae or Convolvulaceae families.