Efficacy of Some Plant Extracts, Sorghum bicolor, Medicago sativa, and Cynodon dactylon in Controlling Weeds and Identification of Active Substances

Abstract

Alyousef, A., G. Ibrahim and A. Al Mouemar. 2023. Efficacy of Some Plant Extracts, Sorghum bicolor, Medicago sativa, and Cynodon dactylon in Controlling Weeds and Identification of Active Substances. Arab Journal of Plant Protection, 41(2): 161-167. https://doi.org/10.22268/AJPP-41.2.161167 This investigation was carried out during 2020 in the farm and laboratories of the Faculty of Agriculture and the Central Laboratory of the Faculty of Sciences, Damascus University, to investigate the effect of hexane extract of Sorghum bicolor L., Medicago sativa L., Cynodon dactylon L. on growth of three weed species: Setaria viridis (L.) Beauv, Urtica urens L and Diplotaxis erucoides (L.) DC. The chemical analysis of hexane plant extracts, used in integrated weed control programs, was carried out to identify the most important active substances present in these extracts, using a gas chromatography device attached to a mass spectrometer (GC-MS). The results obtained showed that the S. bicolor extract was superior in controlling the studied weed species, with controlling efficacy of 77.4% for the weed U. urens. Whereas the most sensitive weed was S. viridis (L.) whose plant height was reduced to 12.7 cm with dry matter content of 5.79% compared to the control whose length reached 39 cm with the same dry matter content. Nine substances were identified in the S. bicolor extract with highest percentage of Neophytadiene (32.045%), and nine substances in M. sativa extract with the highest percentage of Phytol (28.23%), whereas 14 compounds were identified in the C. dactylon extract, with 17.55% propanoic acid. Keywords: Weed management, plant extracts, GC-MS, active substances