Red crown rot symptoms are continuing to progress across Indiana, and additional affected fields are being identified as the season advances.
Darcy Telenko
Foliar diseases are becoming increasingly evident in corn fields across Indiana, with gray leaf spot emerging as the most prevalent disease thus far this season.
Continued scouting of both corn and soybean fields remains critical for making timely and informed disease management decisions.
Red crown rot of soybean, caused by Calonectria Ilicicola, continues to be a concern in Indiana.
Corn growth stages are quite variable across Indiana but several areas with early planted corn are reaching tassel.
Indiana has received quite a bit of rain in the last few months, and fields are flooded throughout the state. How can you determine if you just have a flooding injury or a seedling disease has taken hold? Standing water leads to root suffocation as roots are oxygen-deprived and CO2 builds up. Digging up a few plants in the area can help determine the issue. If the outer root tissue sloughs off and reveals the white hair-like core of the root, then there may only be a flooding injury. If the roots appear rotted, brown and mushy, then a root rot may have infected the stressed plants. Flooding also kills the nitrogen-fixing bacteria, so you can cut open the soybean nodules to see if they have lost their healthy pink color. In contrast, seedling diseases, such as Phytophthora root and stem rot, can leave the roots brown and rotted, but[Read More…]
We are continuing to track the activity of tar spot.
Questions about tar spot management were already beginning to surface as corn planting nears completion across Indiana.
Wheat development continues across Indiana. In central Indiana, wheat is currently flowering (Feekes 10.5), while wheat in our southern Indiana research plots has advanced to the dough stage (Feekes 11.2).
It is time to keep an eye on wheat for diseases and scab risk. There are a number of foliar diseases in wheat to watch out for. These include – leaf, strip and stem (Fig. 1A, B, C), Septoria leaf spot and tan spot (Fig. 2A, B). A number of resources are available to help distinguish wheat leaf diseases and “Identifying Rust Diseases of Wheat and Barley” and Crop Protection Network Encyclopedia Wheat plant samples can always be submitted to the Purdue Plant Pest Diagnostic Lab for disease identification and confirmation. Wheat in southern Indians was flowering (Feekes 10.5.1) when I was in our plots in Vincennes on Saturday (April 25), which is a week or so earlier than I expected. Our plots in West Lafayette were at Feekes 9 (ligule of last leaf just visible). During flowering (anthesis, Fig 3A) warm, wet weather with high relative humidity will favor[Read More…]
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