Herbicide-resistant weed issues are becoming more of a concern for farmers.

The Latest Weed Resistance Surveys were done in 2014 in the Parkland area of the Province and in 2015 in the Grasslands area.

It shows that almost 60% of farmland in Saskatchewan has a herbicide-resistant weed on it, that’s up from 30% in 2009 and 10% in 2003.

Dr. Hugh Beckie with Agriculture & Agri-Food Canada talks about why we’re seeing an increase in herbicide resistance.

"We've come to a point where we're using the same herbicides year-after-year, we haven't really had new herbicides to add to the mix," he said. "With just the march of time, eventually after 30 years or so you just hit that brick wall and it's inevitable that if you have this abundance of weeds on your land you are going to select for resistance."    

The Herbicide Resistant Weeds Survey was one of a number of topics yesterday, during the first day of the 2017 Agronomy Research Update in Saskatoon.

"In the management questionnaire, the average cost that growers indicated to us was about $12 an acre or $30 a hector," Backie said. "This comprises both the extra herbicide use that they need to manage these reads. Also, it factors in some of the crop yield losses or quality that they have observed either it's pulse crops or cereal crops."