Wheat School: Scouting key to better fungicide decisions

Winter is a great time to recalibrate your approach to managing wheat diseases and applying fungicides.

That's the message Penn State University plant pathologist Alyssa Collins shared with agronomists attending the Ontario Certified Crop Advisors annual meeting earlier this month.

It's a dormant period for humans and also for fungi and plants, says Collins. "So we get to start from zero and look ahead to what our year is going to be, and remind ourselves what are our major issues in any given crop." It's also a good time for growers to identify the periods when the need to be actively scouting so they can gather the field feedback required to make good fungicide decisions.

On this episode of RealAgriculture's Wheat School, Collins shares tips for growers on how they can fine tune their scouting approach for the coming growing season.

The first thing growers need to ask themselves is when do they need a fungicide? "There are lots of situations where fungicide is not helpful," says Collins. "If you don't have a fungal disease, you're not going to get any benefit from a fungicide. The wheat crop may also be suffering from a fungus that is beyond the reach of a fungicide treatment. When it comes to root rots, for example, we can't get the fungicide down to the area where it would be effective."

On the other side of the coin, Collins says it's also important to know when a fungicide can really help a crop. She stresses the importance of knowing which fungicides are most effective on specific diseases. "That information is readily available and is updated every year. There are situations where we know that the fungal disease causes us enough yield or quality loss that we really do get an economic benefit from a fungicide."

#farming #wheat #agronomy #scouting

Website: https://www.realagriculture.com/wheat...

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