Tag Archives: scouting

Weekly Field Update 8/24/20

Posted on by
Reply

Statewide

Dr. Tony Keinath reports, “For the past few years, Orondis Opti on cucumber and cantaloupe and Orondis Ultra on pumpkin and watermelon have been the best fungicides to manage downy mildew. Based on results from a spring 2020 cucumber experiment at Coastal REC, Orondis is no longer the “silver bullet” it was 2 years ago. In my experiment, Orondis Opti rotated with Bravo controlled downy mildew in the early part of the season, but disease increased significantly during the latter part of the season and ended up higher than expected. Part of the shortcoming of the Orondis Opti/Bravo spray program was the Bravo rotation. Bravo sprayed by itself every other week did not control downy mildew at all, so spraying Orondis Opti/Bravo acted like Orondis Opti sprayed every other week, which was not enough. The labels for Orondis Opti and Orondis Ultra say they must be rotated with another fungicide. For the rest of the 2020 season, use Orondis Opti/Ranman + chlorothalonil on cucumber and cantaloupe, and Orondis Ultra rotated with Gavel or Ranman + chlorothalonil on pumpkin and watermelon. Always use the high rate (2.5 pints/acre) of Orondis products. Note that the mancozeb in Gavel or adding chlorothalonil helps to manage other foliar diseases like gummy stem blight and anthracnose. Yield data and input costs from my experiment are being analyzed to see if spraying Orondis leads to a higher net return despite the higher cost of this fungicide. Results will be presented at the virtual Cucurbit meeting in February 2021 to help growers plan downy mildew fungicide programs for the 2021 season.”

Cucurbit downy mildew continues to spread across the state.

Coastal

Rob Last reports, “Fall crops continue to grow well in the area.  Given the current weather patterns pests and disease are active in some crops particularly where there are volunteers remaining from previous crops.  Vigilance will be required in scouting an pesticide management programs.  If In doubt scout.”

Midlands

Justin Ballew reports, “It’s been cool, cloudy, and kind of pleasant outside this past week, though that has the vegetable crops growing a little slower. We’ve gotten some decent rains in most areas around the midlands as well. Bacterial spot is really showing up on fall tomatoes as a result of all the recent rain. It could be a bad fall for bacterial spot if the weather stays like this. Caterpillars are already out there on fall brassicas. It doesn’t take long once they’re planted. Start scouting, scout often, and rotate insecticides. Remember to contact one of us about screening your farm for insecticide resistance in diamondback moths once you start seeing populations build up.”

Bacterial spot and speck start on the bottom of the plant and can be splashed onto higher leaves and fruit by rain drops. Photo from Justin Ballew.
Start scouting for caterpillars as soon as your fall brassicas are planted. Photo from Justin Ballew

Pee Dee

Bruce McLean reports, “Both fruit and vegetable development has slowed a bit due to cloudy conditions. Sunny conditions needed. Sweetpotatoes are sizing well and will be ready for harvest soon. Fall cucumbers and squash should soon be ready to start harvesting. Fall brassicas are being planted now. Muscadine crop is getting close to harvest. Noble is around 90% ripe; Carlos is around 60%; Doreen is still around 25%. Brix (sugar content) is off due to rain and cloudy conditions. Noble and Carlos brix are averaging around 11% with a low of 9.2% and a high of 15.0%. Doreen is averaging less than 10%. Did find a few Doreen that brix was over 19%… candy. Sunny conditions definitely needed.”

Noble muscadines around 90% ripe. Photo from Bruce McLean.

Tony Melton reports, “Beginning to harvest processing sweet potatoes but some have been stunted and delayed by excessive rain.  Spraying processing peas for cowpea curculio.  Starting to plant processing greens by seed.  Even though lots of rain and having to mud through fields cucumbers for pickles are being harvested and still being planted.”

Upstate

Andy Rollins reports, “Blueberry pruning is best served for the dormant time of year late January-late February.  I met with a commercial grower who was anxious about getting started early partly because he has many plants completely unproductive for the second year in a row. I like to call this revenge pruning as that is the primary motivation. Be careful, you could end up hurting yourself more in the long run. In his case, it was all about light and proper pruning to encourage light down through the canopy. The orignial spacing of Rabbiteye type varieties was very close so we also considered killing every other plant to get more light into the bushes but this would not replace the need for properly selectively removing a few of the oldest canes each year, spacing them out so there is better light penetration. For a detailed explanation, please see NCSU Blueberry specialist Bill Cline’s presentation.”

Field Update – 6/29/20

Posted on by
Reply

Coastal

Rob Last reports, “In our area crops are generally looking good with watermelons and cantaloupes coming to harvest.  From a pest perspective, we are finding some early pickleworm and melon worm damage occurring. In addition, cucumber beetles and squash bugs remain active. Cucurbit downy mildew is being found in the area and as such protectant fungicide applications remain viable options. If in doubt scout.”

Zack Snipes reports, “Last week was full of heavy rain and heat. It finally feels like June.  Crops are either going one of two ways right now:  they either look great or they are succumbing to disease. Tomatoes are picking great and I’ve seen some really nice watermelons finish up this week. Peppers are loving this heat but I have seen an uptick in bacterial leaf spot (BLS) in the crop. Keep up with spray programs (copper and Manzate) for BLS in pepper. Tomatoes are also starting to look rough with all the heat and rain. If your tomato crop dies, please identify the culprit so we can better manage it next year. Soilborne diseases such as bacterial wilt and southern blight will not go away next year. I will be more than happy to work with folks on crop planning, cover crops, and rotation on their farms so we can avoid crop failures.

IMG_0873.jpg

A quick cut of the stem of a wilting plant and a dip into water can help to positively identify Bacterial Wilt in tomato. The presence of the pathogen will yield a clear to white ooze coming from the plant after a few minutes in the water. Photo from Zack Snipes.

IMG_0783.jpg

Bacterial Leaf Spot is spreading in pepper due to the heavy rains and increased heat. Photo from Zack Snipes.

Midlands

Justin Ballew reports, “We finally got some widespread rain mid-week and it has rained in places most days since. Some areas received enough rain to cause temporary flooding in lower-lying fields. Remember, according to produce safety guidelines, any produce that was flooded may not be harvested. We should expect diseases to worsen in the coming weeks. Powdery mildew in cucurbits and bacterial spot in tomatoes has certainly increased in the past week. Crops are still developing very rapidly and we are picking lots of squash, zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, eggplant, sweetcorn, greens, beans, etc.”

20200626_124325.jpg

This field of cucumbers was temporarily flooded by the heavy rain last week. Photo from Justin Ballew

20200626_130957

A crew picking squash in Lexington. Squash and zucchini are growing like wildfire in the midlands. Photo from Justin Ballew.

Pee Dee

Tony Melton reports, “Raining almost every day some storms causing downed trees.   Root rot bad applying a lot of potassium phosphide. A few strawberry growers still picking around rains. Downy mildew bad but Ranman and Orondis are doing a good job of control. Peas are maturing and will not be too long until harvest. We need to hurry to get the second crop planted on the same land. Still planting sweet potatoes. Okra and tomatoes just started to bare. Southern stem blight is bad and we’re spraying Fontelis. Some first crop butterbeans are being harvested.”

Field Update – 5/4/20

Posted on by
Reply

Coastal

Zack Snipes reports, “We have had a very wet spring with some places receiving over 13 inches of rain this month.  Crops look surprisingly good considering the excess rain and cooler nights.  I have seen an increase in worm activity on brassicas, particularly the cabbage looper.  With all the rain, I have seen some hot spots of bacterial spot in tomato.  If you scout from your truck or tractor, you will not find bacterial spot until much later in the growing season.  The disease starts on the bottom leaves of your tomatoes and works its way up throughout the season.  Preventative products such as copper, mancozeb, and plant activator products are the only control measures we have. Get out and scout and look very closely, as the disease is very difficult to see in the beginning stages.”

IMG_9886

Cabbage looper on a cabbage leaf. Photo from Zack Snipes.

IMG_9902

Bacterial spot starts on the bottom leaves and works its way up the plant throughout the season. Photo from Zack Snipes.

Midlands

Justin Ballew reports, “The weather was really nice this past week. We got about an inch of rain early Thursday morning and it has been breezy since, so all the water dried up fast.  The weather conditions have been perfect for grey mold in strawberries and it is showing up in areas where folks are falling behind in sanitation. It looks like there are more blooms on the plants this week, but with temperatures in the 80’s for a few days, that may slow down some.  Thrips are still an issue in places and treatments are going out, so keep scouting. If you need to make an application for thrips, do it early in the morning or late in the day to avoid spraying foraging pollinators. Keep looking for spider mites as well.”

20200430_145250.jpg

Rotting berries covered in Botrytis spores can go unnoticed in between plants.  Every time the wind blows, spores from these berries will be dispersed to other areas of the field. Photo from Justin Ballew.

Sarah Scott reports, “Peaches are progressing nicely in the Ridge area. Growers started harvesting early varieties. Some issues of bacterial canker are still becoming more noticeable in later varieties. The first sprays for scale crawlers have been applied and growers are continuing weed and orchard management sprays. Still picking strawberries. Crops for summer harvest are being planted still such as tomatoes and cucurbits. We’ve had some nice rainfall over the past week to keep soil moisture up but we have had high winds that have caused some limb breakage in orchards and stress on young vegetable transplants in the field.”

thrips

Russetting on peach, possibly from earlier thrips damage. Photo from Sarah Scott.

Pee Dee

Tony Melton reports, “Winds are awful and damaging crops (sandblasting, wringing off plants, leaving spots on leaves and stems, causing wounds where disease like damping off can start and enter plants), stunting plants, and causing early flowering in tomatoes and peppers.  Insects are awful, including grasshopper, thrips, diamondback moth, yellow-margined beetle, and false cinch bugs.  Rains and irrigation to keep down sand blowing are causing leaching of nitrogen. In combination with decreased plant growth due to wind, we are adding extra nitrogen to get the plant size needed to get yields.  Hopefully, we can keep the processing tomatoes and peppers in the growth stage a little longer before the fruiting stage really kicks-in and further reduces plant growth.”

Upstate

Kerrie Roach reports, “While some have been hesitant, many Upstate Farmers Markets opened for the season this past weekend. Utilizing revised set-ups, handwashing stations, and promoting social distancing people still came out to support growers. Strawberries in Pickens and Anderson Counties are producing well and growers are selling out quickly. Weather conditions have been great for growing the last few weeks, and many of our market growers will be starting to move into the production stage over the next few weeks.”