Agricultural News
Bob Hunger Says Late Developing Wheat Extends Window of Spraying for Foliar Disease This Season- But Does it Make Economic Sense?
Sun, 12 May 2019 05:40:57 CDT
At the 2019 Lahoma Wheat Field Day, Radio Oklahoma Ag Network Farm Director Ron Hays caught up with Oklahoma State University Extension Plant Pathologist Dr. Bob Hunger, who has been watching the rapid rise of foliar diseases in Oklahoma on the 2019 hard red winter wheat crop.
Dr. Hunger tells Hays and those gathered at the Lahoma Field Day that if you have suseptible wheat varieties to several of these foliar diseases, especially, leaf rust and septoria, that it might still be possible to apply a fungicide to help perserve wheat yield potential. Hunger says that you would have to be at least 30 days away from harvest in those fields in order to meet the label requirements of the fungicides available- which means for most Oklahoma wheat farmers, spraying may not be an option.
Dr. Hunger says disease has come in late in many Oklahoma wheat fields- but that the wheat has been behind normal development, which has made this an interesting race between arrival of the soft dough stage and economic harm by the disease. "As the plant matures, as it starts getting into that dough stage, it doesn't matter near as much how severe the rust is- it's during flowering, pre flowering when it's heading and then just right at the end of flowering when the kernels are forming that the level at the level of rust is most critical." He adds that the harm from rust at the milk or dough stage goes way down.
The wheat prices make these last minutes decisions tough- Dr. Hunger believes "the low wheat prices make it a lot harder to figure out what to do. If I had a really good resistant variety and it was looking good now and I had pretty much full kernels, I would be tempted to go without a spray."
Listen to the conversation between Hays and Dr. Hunger by clicking on the LISTEN BAR below.
And to read the most recent Wheat Disease Report from Dr. Bob Hunger, click or tap here.
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