Saluyot Weed in Rice Fields: How to Spot and Control It
The saluyot weed is the same jute mallow that many Filipinos cook as a vegetable. But inside a rice crop, it acts as a damo. It grows in rainfed lowland rice fields in the Philippines. This page shows you how to spot it early and how it competes with your palay. Then it shows how to control it before it sets seed.
What Is Saluyot Weed?
Saluyot is an upright plant with a woody stem. Its English name is jute mallow, and it belongs to the jute family, Tiliaceae. Most of us know it from the palengke and the kitchen. Some farmers also call it tagabang or tugabang. In a garden it is a crop. Inside a rice paddy, nobody planted it, so we call it a saluyot weed because it takes what the rice needs.
You will find it in rainfed lowland rice fields. Its life lasts one season only. Within one crop it sprouts, grows, flowers, sets seed and dies. Seed is its only way to spread. Each long pod splits when dry and drops many small seeds on the soil. Those seeds stay in the bukid and sprout again with the next crop, so a few plants left today mean many more next season.
| Name | Saluyot weed |
|---|---|
| Scientific name | Corchorus olitorius |
| Family | Tiliaceae |
| Weed group | Broadleaves (see the three groups) |
| Local names | Saluyot, tagabang, tugabang |
| Life cycle | Annual |
| Spreads by | Seeds |
| Where it grows | Rainfed lowland rice fields |
How to Identify Saluyot Weed
Look for an upright plant with a woody stem among your rice hills. The leaves are oval to long and pointed, with saw toothed edges. Check where each leaf meets the stem, since small clusters of leaves often grow there. As a broadleaf weed, it has wide leaves with netted veins, unlike grasses and sedges. When it blooms, the flowers are yellow. Then long, slender pods with ten ribs form, each ending in a single beak.
- An upright plant with a woody stem standing among the rice hills.
- Oval to long pointed leaves with saw toothed edges, the same leaves you cook at home.
- Small clusters of leaves growing near the point where each leaf joins the stem.
- Yellow flowers that soon turn into long, slender seed pods.
- Pods with ten ribs that run along the length and end in a single beak.
- Look alike tip: salsaluyot is smaller, and its pods carry 6 to 8 wings instead of ribs.
Why It Hurts Your Palay
Saluyot is good food, but in a rice crop it competes with your palay for sunlight, water and fertilizer. Its upright stem and wide leaves cast shade on the rice nearby. Young rice suffers most, because it cannot yet outgrow the weed. Every bit of fertilizer it takes is fertilizer your crop does not get.
Since it is an annual that spreads by seed, each plant left to mature fills the soil with seeds for the next season. Its woody stems can also get in the way at harvest. Seeds and pod pieces may mix with the harvested palay and lower its quality. That matters most if you keep seed for planting. Weedy spots can also give insects and rats a place to hide.
How to Control Saluyot Weed
- Pull the plants by hand while they are young, before the yellow flowers open. If you want to eat the leaves, take them only from a field that was not sprayed.
- Do not let even a few plants form pods. Each pod drops many seeds, and those seeds come back with every new crop.
- Keep standing water in the paddy when rain allows. Most weeds that grow from seed sprout more easily on exposed soil than under water.
- If you want saluyot for the table, plant it in a separate garden plot, not inside the paddy, and pick it before it seeds.
What to Do at Each Age of Your Rice
- 0 to 5 days: keep the soil saturated. Use a pre emergence herbicide only if the field had many weeds last season.
- 6 to 10 days: hand weed in transplanted rice. In direct seeded rice, this is the window for an early post emergence spray.
- 11 to 20 days: keep water in the field, weed by hand or with a rotary weeder, and let Azolla and the Altica beetle help. Spray only if those fail.
- 21 to 30 days: top up the water and keep weeding. Spray only if weeding fails.
- 31 to 40 days (transplanted rice): hand weed. A spray this late is only a rescue.
- After any post emergence spray, bring the water back within 1 to 3 days at 3 to 5 cm and hold it for 4 to 5 days. Keep young rice above it.
Active Ingredients That Work on Broadleaves
If water and weeding cannot hold saluyot weed down, choose an active ingredient that works on broadleaves at the age of your rice. Each active ingredient in it is in a herbicide registered in the Philippines for rice. Shop by the ingredient on the label, never by the brand. If your field also has other kinds of weeds, the weed control helper in anee.io finds the ingredients that cover all of them.
| Rice age (days after planting) | Transplanted rice (lipat tanim) | Direct seeded rice (sabog tanim) |
|---|---|---|
| 0 to 5 days | Pretilachlor, Oxadiazon, Butachlor plus 2,4 D IBE, Pyrazosulfuron ethyl plus pretilachlor, Imazosulfuron, Penoxsulam plus butachlor, Tefuryltrione plus triafamone, Thiobencarb plus 2,4 D IBE | Pretilachlor, Oxadiazon, Pretilachlor plus butachlor, Butachlor plus 2,4 D IBE, Pendimethalin, Pyrazosulfuron ethyl plus pretilachlor, Butachlor with safener |
| 6 to 10 days | Butachlor plus propanil, Cyhalofop butyl plus bispyribac sodium, Bispyribac sodium, Penoxsulam plus cyhalofop butyl, Pendimethalin, Cyhalofop butyl plus propanil, Imazosulfuron, Propyrisulfuron, Clomazone plus propanil, Thiobencarb plus propanil, Flucetosulfuron, Cyhalofop butyl plus florpyrauxifen benzyl | Butachlor plus propanil, Cyhalofop butyl plus bispyribac sodium, Bispyribac sodium, Pyribenzoxim plus cyhalofop butyl, Penoxsulam plus cyhalofop butyl, Cyhalofop butyl plus propanil, Pyrazosulfuron ethyl plus pretilachlor, Pendimethalin, Propyrisulfuron, Clomazone plus propanil, Thiobencarb plus propanil, Pretilachlor plus pyribenzoxim, Penoxsulam, Flucetosulfuron, Cyhalofop butyl plus florpyrauxifen benzyl |
| 11 to 20 days | Cyhalofop butyl plus bispyribac sodium, Bispyribac sodium, Pyribenzoxim plus cyhalofop butyl, Penoxsulam plus cyhalofop butyl, Metamifop plus bispyribac sodium, Bentazone, Cyhalofop butyl plus ethoxysulfuron, Propyrisulfuron, Fenoxaprop P ethyl plus ethoxysulfuron, Flucetosulfuron, Carfentrazone ethyl, Florpyrauxifen benzyl, Cyhalofop butyl plus florpyrauxifen benzyl | Cyhalofop butyl plus bispyribac sodium, Bispyribac sodium, Pyribenzoxim plus cyhalofop butyl, Penoxsulam plus cyhalofop butyl, Metamifop plus bispyribac sodium, Bentazone, Pyribenzoxim, Cyhalofop butyl plus ethoxysulfuron, Propyrisulfuron, Fenoxaprop P ethyl plus ethoxysulfuron, Flucetosulfuron, Carfentrazone ethyl, Florpyrauxifen benzyl, Cyhalofop butyl plus florpyrauxifen benzyl |
| 21 to 30 days | 2,4 D amine, 2,4 D IBE, MCPA, Metamifop plus bispyribac sodium, Bentazone, Metsulfuron methyl plus chlorimuron ethyl, Fenoxaprop P ethyl plus ethoxysulfuron, Carfentrazone ethyl | 2,4 D amine, 2,4 D IBE, Cyhalofop butyl plus bispyribac sodium, Pyribenzoxim plus cyhalofop butyl, MCPA, Metamifop plus bispyribac sodium, Bentazone, Metsulfuron methyl plus chlorimuron ethyl, Pyribenzoxim, Carfentrazone ethyl |
| 31 to 40 days | Metsulfuron methyl plus chlorimuron ethyl | Not listed for direct seeded rice |
Spray Safely
Use only herbicides registered with the Fertilizer and Pesticide Authority, and follow the label on the pack: the rate, the timing, the water and the protective clothing. Switch herbicide groups between seasons so the weeds do not learn to survive them. Our guide to herbicides for rice explains the groups.
Keep Saluyot Weed Out Next Season
- Plant clean, certified seed. Weed seeds mixed into the punla are the easiest way in.
- Keep the seedbed, the canals and the bunds free of weeds, so seed does not wash or blow into the paddy.
- Prepare the land well: flood, plow, let the weed seeds sprout, then kill them when you harrow. Level the field so water covers it evenly.
- Pull escapes before they flower and set seed, and carry them out of the paddy instead of leaving them on the bund.
- Keep the field clean after harvest and through the fallow, so fewer seeds build up in the soil for next season.
These steps work for every broadleaf weed in the paddy, not only this one. The weed management guide puts them in order for a whole season.
Not Sure It Is Saluyot Weed?
Take a clear photo of the leaf, the stem and the flower or seed head, then ask Anee, the smart farm technician in anee.io, in Tagalog or English. Anee tells you which weed it most likely is, its group, and what to do at the age of your rice. You can also put the weeding days on your cropping calendar, so the team knows when to go in.
anee.io keeps your weeding, spraying and water on one calendar, and Anee answers when a plant looks wrong.
- Weeding days on the season calendar
- Photos and notes for every lot
- Anee, the smart farm technician, in Tagalog or English
Questions Farmers Ask About Saluyot Weed
What is saluyot called in Tagalog and other local names?
How do I control saluyot in my rice field?
Is the saluyot weed in my field the same as the saluyot sold in the market?
Get Saluyot out of your field
With Libre + Anee, read the whole guide: how to tell it from your crop, and what to do and spray at every age of your crop.
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