Disease guide is gold mine for growers
Disease guide is gold mine for growers
By Andrew Swallow
GROWERS and agronomists should make better disease control decisions next season, thanks to the HGCAs Wheat Disease Management Guide, launched this week, say its authors.
"The product information in the guide is almost a gold mine for growers," says co-author Bill Clark of ADAS. "It contains years of data from independent organisations."
A star chart gives a rough guide to which active ingredients combat which diseases, and dose response curves offer a graphical comparison of each actives efficacy against the main foliar diseases.
"Until this guide, that information has never been readily available to growers," says Mr Clark. "They had nothing to say what is the difference between a 0.5 and a 0.6 dose of a product in terms of disease control."
The guide should also help growers to spot a false economy on product choice more easily.
"If someone rings up and says Ive got some really cheap flutriafol, you can turn to the dose response curves or click on flutriafol in the on-line version and see why its so cheap."
But product choice is only part of the guide, which aims to answer four key foliar disease control questions: Why control disease? When to spray? What dose to apply? Which product to use?
"It is not a quick read but it is structured so you can dip into it and make sense of each section alone," says fellow author Neil Paveley, also of ADAS.
Stem-base disease and ear diseases are dealt with in separate sections and the guide concludes with an overall decision-making guide for spray timings from pre-T1 treatments to T3 ear washes.
Grower and HGCA cereals research and development committee member Stewart Brown is very impressed with the guide.
"It is one of the best practical guides published by the HGCA to help farmers in this very difficult area. It clearly lays out the reasons behind the spray timings of T1, T2 and T3 and the need to spray disease-susceptible varieties before evidence of disease is visible."
The 31-page guide will be mailed to all those who receive HGCA topic sheets and is free to all levy payers on request (020-7520 3920). An on-line version can be viewed on the HGCAs web-site, www.hgca.com. *
WHEAT DISEASE GUIDE
• Sharper decision-making.
• Grower and agronomist tool.
• Builds on Wheat Growth Guide.
• Free to all levy payers.
The HGCAs Wheat Disease Management Guide will help growers understand key spray timings and sharpen both grower and agronomist skills, says joint author Bill Clark of ADAS.