Because of interest in monitoring crop response to weed interference, greenhouse experiments were conducted to evaluate interference of purple and yellow nutsedge on the growth, development, and spectral response of cotton and soybean. Cotton fresh weight was reduced 9 to 42% compared with the control when grown with yellow and purple nutsedge. Fresh weight of soybean was reduced 27 to 60% when it emerged simultaneously with yellow nutsedge and 45 to 63% when it emerged 7 d after yellow nutsedge. Soybean fresh weight was reduced 30 to 35% when it emerged simultaneously with purple nutsedge and 44 to 72% when it emerged 7 d after purple nutsedge. Reflectance data were analyzed using wavelet transformation techniques with the HAAR mother wavelet. Nine extracted features from the cotton and soybean leaf reflectance measurements were used to classify single-leaf cotton and soybean reflectance measurements to predict whether cotton or soybean was growing in the presence or absence of purple and yellow nutsedge. After training the system, the ability to separate leaf reflectance measurements of crops growing weed free from those growing in the presence of purple and yellow nutsedge was tested using cross-validation with the nearest mean classifier. Cross-validation accuracy results for cotton were 62 to 70%. Cross-validation accuracy for soybean and yellow nutsedge was similar, regardless of emergence, and ranged from 60 to 71%. Features extracted from the soybean reflectance measurements were not as effective in classifying soybean leaf reflectance measurements based on the presence or absence of purple nutsedge. A decrease in accuracy was observed for both simultaneous and delayed soybean emergence in purple nutsedge fresh weight categories from more than 2,560 g to more than 3,420 g. Overall, the system correctly classified soybean emerging simultaneously with purple nutsedge 58 to 74% and soybean emerging 7 d after purple nutsedge 53 to 67%. These results indicate the potential of differentiating crops under stress using spectral reflectance, although refinements to the system must be made before it is field ready.

Nomenclature: Yellow nutsedge, Cyperus esculentus L. CYPES; purple nutsedge, Cyperus rotundus L. CYPRO; soybean, Glycine max (L.) Merr.; cotton, Gossypium hirsutum L.