Abstract:The occurrence and infestation of barnyardgrass, Echinochloa crusgalli Beauv., in paddy fields constitutes a major threat in rice production. To determine the influence of barnyardgrass on the growth of paddy rice and its economic infestation level, additive series experiment and curve fit were adopted to study the change of rice yield characters under different density of barnyardgrass. The results showed that with the interference of barnyardgrass, the tillers, effective spikes, 1000-grain weight and yield of paddy rice decreased gradually as the weed density increased. The exponential regression model y=beaxwas relatively better for describing the relationship between barnyardgrass density and rice tillers (y=493.74e-0.0164x, P<0.0001), effective spikes (y=437.2e-0.0165x, P<0.0001) and 1000-grain weight (y=21.876e-0.0006x, P<0.005), while logarithmic regression model y=aLnx+b was the best for rice yield (y=-1250.4Lnx+6375.4, P<0.0001) or yield loss (y=18.844Lnx+3.9182, P<0.0001). When herbicide such as acetochlor+bensulfuron-methyl, butachlor, molinate or quinclorac was used to control barnyardgrass in paddy fields, the economic infestation level for barnyardgrass was 0.71%-1.10% and the economic threshold was about 0.85 plant/m2.