Agricultural News
OSU's Newest Addition to the Wheat Improvement Team, Dr. Meriem Aoun, is Excited to Fight Wheat Disease
Thu, 19 May 2022 04:01:05 CDT
At the Lahoma field day, KC Sheperd talked with Dr. Meriem Aoun, OSU's Wheat Pathologist and the newest addition to the OSU Wheat Improvement Team. Aoun talks about different varieties of wheat that can benefit producers in terms of disease resistance.
Aoun said they did not see as much disease in Lahoma as they did in other locations. In Lahoma, Aoun added she saw some symptoms of barley yellow dwarf, but that was all.
"The diseases did not show up until late March or early April," Aoun said. "I think because of the drought stress, we were seeing mainly barley yellow dwarf virus."
Aoun said she also saw a lot of wheat streak mosaic virus. Barley yellow dwarf is something very common to see in Oklahoma, she added, and the state is a hot spot for barley yellow dwarf virus.
"I think what surprised me most this year was that we have so many samples," Aoun said. "Around 90 percent of the samples we received the other day tested positive for wheat streak mosaic virus."
After talking to different growers, Aoun said many of them decided to make hay out of their wheat because the crop would be severely affected if it had all of these viruses.
"In the future, they need to look for a resistant variety," Aoun said. "For example, we have the OSU wheat variety, Uncharted, which has two barley yellow dwarf resistant genes."
The Breakthrough wheat variety, Aoun said, has the resistance for wheat streak mosaic virus. Aoun noted she also saw some of the private companies have varieties like Guardian that provide resistance to wheat streak mosaic virus that can be used in the future.
"It is also really important to be able to control volunteer wheat in the field because those are niches for insects and mites," Aoun said. "We want to make sure and control them well so that we can reduce the population of aphids and mites in the field."
Another option, Aoun said, is to have the gap between harvest and emergence of the new crop. A gap of one or two weeks would be enough to reduce the population of aphids and mites in the field, she added.
Aoun also mentioned it is important for producers to send their samples back so she can study for future use.
"Especially for rust diseases, those are rapidly developing pathogens, so the issue is even if we say we have a resistant variety to rust, you never know what it will look like in the future," Aoun said. "The races can change, and the resistant genes that are effective today may not be effective in the coming couple of years."
Because of this, Aoun said it is critical to know what races are present in wheat so she can know what resistant genes are affected. This will help have a good combination of resistant genes and good varieties, she added.
Sending samples to the OSU Wheat Improvement Team to be tested is simple.
"If you see leaf rust or stripe rust, then you take the leaf, keep it in an envelope and have it dry for one or two days, and then ship it to my lab and then I will isolate the races and look at what we have," Aoun said.
Aoun said she chose to join to OSU Wheat improvement team because Oklahoma is a great place to grow wheat and she is passionate about wheat science.
"Oklahoma is one of the major wheat producing states and I am happy to contribute to the wheat industry in a state where wheat is important," Aoun said.
Click the LISTEN BAR below to hear more from Meriem Aoun on different varieties of wheat and how they can be effective in preventing disease.
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