The present study was carried out to evaluate the selectivity of the herbicide tembotrione, applied at post-emergence of pearl millet. Two experiments were conducted, evaluating primarily the effect of the herbicide on three pearl millet cultivars (ADR-300, ADR-500 and ADR-7010) under greenhouse conditions. The hybrid ADR-7010 was later tested under field conditions, when increasing doses of tembotrione were applied at two stages of plant development (four and seven fully developed leaves). Under greenhouse conditions, the cultivars presented similar percentages of reduction of shoot dry matter accumulation, after tembotrione application at 75.5 g ha-1 at the four-expanded leaf stage .Under field conditions, tembotrione showed the highest phytotoxicity when applied at the early stages of hybrid ADR-7010. Tembotrione selectivity is dependent on the dose and developmental stage of pearl millet at the time of herbicide application. The use of tembotrione over growing millet in areas intended for grain production was found to be a viable alternative to weed control.
weeds; Pennisetum glaucum; tricetones
