Dr. Ron Pitblado, Weather INovations Incorporated

This project will help Ontario corn producers make strategic decisions with regard to fungicide applications for the control of foliar diseases. This project focuses on some of the most common foliar diseases in corn such as Grey Leaf Spot, Northern Corn Leaf Blight, Leaf Rust and Eye Spot.

In the near future, trial data will be used to develop a Strategic Fungicide Advisory that will increase profitability for corn producers through the development of near real time indicators to improve the cost benefit analysis on the investment in fungicide application. The advisory will target opportunities to increase returns through the effective use and timing of fungicides while minimizing the environmental footprint by advising against fungicide applications where the probability of an economic return is low.

The project will utilize the expertise and existing research activities of the collaborators. Dr. David Hooker, Greg Stewart and Albert Tenuta have conducted a series of trials in 2008 that will form the basis of the early analysis. The trials that will be included are the three locations in Ridgetown, Exeter and Wingham with 21 corn hybrids in the Ontario Corn Committee Trial and three sites with four hybrids in Belmont, Exeter and Ridgetown in a fungicide trial.

The data set will be analyzed by Dr. Ron Pitblado and others with Weather INnovations Incorporated (WIN) contributing the weather component at each of these locations. A similar set of data points will be developed for 2009. Disease surveys have been conducted on a spot basis over the last five to six years in Ontario by Albert Tenuta. These results will serve as a first evaluation of the prototype model.

Going forward, a web platform will be developed based on the results of the two years data summaries.

It has been well established that crop losses in years of severe disease pressure adversely affect corn grower’s income. Even in years of moderate or lower disease pressure, growers may find some opportunities to selectively apply fungicides to minimize economic losses from these diseases. An advisory to indicate when and what to apply to control any of these foliar diseases is needed.

This project is supported through ORD.