It’s time for the season finale of Ontario Diagnostic Days! The annual Ontario field crop diagnostic days held at Ridgetown, Elora, and Winchester are again virtual in 2021. On this live broadcast, University of Guelph professors Dave Hooker and Francois Tardif join host Shaun Haney to talk three hot topics that are sure to grab growers’… Read More
Clubroot has been confirmed in Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba, and can cause yield losses between 30 and 100 per cent. Sanitation, crop rotation, using resistant cultivars, and managing susceptible weeds are all useful strategies in the clubroot toolbox to mitigate infection, but what other strategies are there, and how effective are they for controlling clubroot… Read More
Tar spot is taking a bite out of yields in some Ontario corn fields but there is hope that growers will have effective tools to manage the leaf disease. Characterized by tar-like speckling on the upper surface of corn leaves, the fungal pathogen has been delivering yield hits ranging from 20 to 60 bushels per… Read More
BASF Canada has received registration approval from the Pest Management Regulatory Agency for Veltyma fungicide. Veltyma provides broad spectrum control against key leaf diseases on multiple crops including corn, potatoes, wheat, and soybeans, including Group 3 resistant biotypes, says the company. The product is registered for broad spectrum control against northern corn leaf blight, tar… Read More
Corn and soybean insects and disease are the focus of Day 3 of Ontario Diagnostic Days. The annual Ontario field crop diagnostic days held at Ridgetown, Elora, and Winchester are again virtual in 2021. On this episode, host Shaun Haney is joined by OMAFRA field crops entomologist Tracey Baute to discuss growing concern about corn rootworm… Read More
Wet, humid weather across Ontario this summer has required many soybean growers to apply two fungicide applications to help control white mould. On this episode of RealAgriculture’s Soybean School, Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs plant pathologist Albert Tenuta discusses best practices to help manage the yield-robbing disease, including canopy construction. Tenuta points… Read More
Spraying a fungicide requires considering the stage of plant a bit differently than when spraying a herbicide. At herbicide timing, the canopy of the crop is a lot shorter and less dense. “For fungicides, we’re now talking about a taller canopy, a canopy that’s probably closed in, and a canopy that’s a little bit diverse… Read More
While it’s important to stay current on new and emerging diseases of the corn crop, it’s still important to keep tabs on the old standbys, such as northern corn leaf blight. “We know the weather’s been favourable for diseases, and we get lots of calls on that,” says Alberta Tenuta, plant pathologist at OMAFRA. There’s… Read More
It’s been dry in parts of Western Canada heading into canola flowering, but has it been dry enough to hold off on spraying for sclerotinia? That’s a question many growers and agronomists in drought-affected areas have been asking themselves over the last week or two. There are really two basic factors to consider in the… Read More
We know that planting a soybean crop is half the battle in getting good yields, but once it’s growing and the potential is there, how can growers protect soybean yield potential? In this Soybean School episode, Ken Currah, agronomist at BASF, joins Bernard Tobin in the field at Oxford County, Ont., to talk white mould,… Read More
Will nozzle type solve the problem of getting efficacy while spraying T3 fungicides? There’s plenty of work done on the right nozzle for this job, but what are the other factors that lead to an efficacious application for controlling fusarium? In this Wheat School episode, our resident agronomist Peter “Wheat Pete” Johnson is fired up… Read More
With T3 fungicide application timing approaching to control fusarium in Ontario’s wheat crop, many growers are wondering whether to spray or not to spray. With the hot, dry Ontario weather pushing into late May, there’s little or no disease in the crop and disease levels could decline further if moisture continues to be scarce. For… Read More
What can growers do, right now, to help reduce the devastating effects pathogens, such as aphanomyces and fusarium, have on pulse crops? Michael Wunsch, plant pathologist with North Dakota State University, joins Kara Oosterhuis for this Pulse School episode to talk about what is and isn’t in farmers’ control. Wunsch’s approach to disease management includes… Read More
The Canola Council of Canada (CCC) has recently updated a few agronomy graphics, including the life cycle of blackleg. “We’ve had different life cycles in the past, but we wanted to update it and provide a little bit more information kind of in a one shot,” says Justine Cornelsen, agronomy specialist with CCC. In this… Read More
With winter wheat progressing rapidly through its growth stages in Ontario, RealAgriculture agronomist Peter Johnson is advising growers to keep a close eye on the crop. With crop development running 10 days ahead of schedule, Johnson says wheat fields need to be scouted to make critical management decisions to optimize yield. On this episode of… Read More