Topping of burley tobacco improves leaf yield and quality characteristics. Manual topping of burley tobacco requires approximately 17 worker hours per hectare. The use of growth regulators to chemically “top” burley tobacco has been reported to have some potential. Previous studies found that chemical topping was most effective when the growth regulator was applied prior to bud elongation. With conventional burley varieties this often resulted in significant yield losses, but chemical topping appeared to be feasible with non-flowering burley types. Recently released burley varieties have later maturity and higher leaf numbers making them potentially better suited to chemical topping. In this study burley variety KT-210 was grown and chemically topped with systemic and local systemic growth regulators. All chemical topping treatments were applied at early button stage and were found to be effective for arresting the development of the flower. Sucker control was similar to manually topped tobacco sprayed with a combination of systemic and local systemic growth regulators. The yield of the chemically topped tobacco was not significantly different from the yield of manually topped. Tobacco buying interests tended to grade a higher proportion of the lead from chemically topped plant into a tip grade, thought there was a slight tendency for the upper stalk leaf to receive a lower quality mark. The results of this test suggest that chemical topping of newer burley varieties may be feasible, but additional work is need to confirm these results. (Reprinted with permission)