Concentrated active ingredient allows for lightweight product that disperses rapidly in water
Blending dry crop protection products with water is like working with kitty litter, according to many farmers.
Once it gets wet, it’s more like oatmeal.
Dow AgroSciences is hoping to erase that stigma with a new product called GoDRI RDT (rapid dispersion technology), said research scientist Rory Degenhardt.
He said dry products have many strategic advantages, but the industry must overcome five main problems:
- Excessive foaming.
- They take too long to mix into solution.
- Some older products are too bulky.
- Insoluble bits that don’t dissolve will plug nozzles.
- Big clumps fall to the bottom of the tank and require lots of agitation.
Read Also
Fall rye hits record high in Manitoba
Winter cereals 2025: More Manitoba fields grew fall rye in 2025 than ever before, but winter wheat slipped and, while spring stand survival was good, drought took its toll
Those are the issues we’ve ad-dressed with GoDRI,” said Degenhardt.
“We have a more concentrated ac-tive ingredient so you handle smaller lightweight packages. That’s a safety factor, and it’s very significant for those farmers who simply don’t like handling chemicals.
“You mix on the ground in your chem. handler. There’s no need to climb up on the tank or lift heavy containers. You dump a small package into the chem. handler. There’s no splash back from liquids and no cutting open bags or inhaling dust. It’s very convenient and safe to use.”
Degenhardt said storage is simplified because dry chemicals can be frozen without affecting efficacy.
“Newly developed co-formulants have helped us overcome the traditional problems with dry products,” he said.
“GoDRI disperses rapidly in water so you’ll spend less time mixing and more time spraying. There’s almost no foaming, no sedimentation at bottom of tank and no nozzle plugging. Very few small jugs will cover a lot of acres.”
He said farmers always ask about water criteria when considering a new product. A lot of spraying takes place in early spring when the weather is cool and the water cooler. Even in mid-summer, some water sources are still cold.
“Rapid dispersion in really cool water was one of our objectives, so our dispersion testing was done at 2 C with hardness levels ranging from 10 to 1,026 parts per million and pH levels from three to nine,” he said.
“Our dispersion time was benchmarked against some of the current best products out there: the Dupont dry technology and some of the other best in class dry technologies and dispersion technologies.”
Degenhardt said the product will not be used as an additive to existing dry chemicals.
Instead, it will be blended only into new products at the manufacturing site. Paradigm, a new broadleaf herbicide that is not yet registered or available, will be the first chemical to incorporate GoDRI RDT.
“If adoption by farmers is as good as it seems so far, I can see that we’ll move the technology into other products.”
For information, visit www.dowagro.ca.
