One of the primary benefits of site-specific agricultural technologies is the potential to reduce the use of polluting inputs, thereby minimizing ecological damage. Weeds are often found in patches, so site-specific (field scale) management offers a straightforward opportunity to minimize ecological effects related to wasteful broadcast use of herbicides. Beyond possible efficiencies related to accurate targeting, site-specific technologies, through a process of parameterizing management decision models for each field, may improve ecological understanding of weed populations and thus encourage ecologically based management. This hypothesis was assessed with a simple model that combined economic injury–level prediction with a single parameter (growing season precipitation) to represent environmental variability. Model simulations of crop yield in response to weed density at a virtual farm and six surrounding regional experiment stations suggested that localized (on-farm field) parameter estimation may help to circumvent the variability associated with damage function extrapolation from small-plot experiments at experiment stations and thereby improve predictive accuracy for site-specific weed management (SSWM) strategies. Thus, remote sensing and SSWM technologies may allow producers to reduce the risk associated with the reduced use of purchased inputs and greater reliance on natural weed population–regulating mechanisms. Effective ecologically based weed management may be dependent on local parameterization of models.

The adoption of precision technologies that spatially register measurements using global positioning systems (GPS) greatly facilitates conducting large-scale on-farm research by farmers. On-farm experiments that utilize producer equipment include variations in agronomic practices that occur in situations where we want to predict the effect of inputs on yield. The domain of inference for such on-farm studies therefore more closely matches that desired by researchers. To investigate the feasibility of on-farm research using GPS, a study was conducted to evaluate the potential benefit of site-specific weed management. The study utilized producer-maintained field-scale equipment on four Montana farms in dryland spring wheat production. Paired site-specific and whole-field herbicide treatment areas were established in 0.9 to 1.9-ha blocks using consultant weed maps and a geographic information system (GIS). Yield was unaffected by herbicide treatment strategy (site-specific or broadcast). Minimal detectable yield differences were evaluated for the experimental design (0.2 T ha−1). Net returns increased when the percentage of field infested by wild oat decreased. Visual ratings of wild oat density taken at harvest indicated no difference in wild oat control between treatments in two of four site-years. This research suggests that producer-owned equipment can be used to compare treatments, but the accuracy and subsequent power of such comparisons are likely to be low.