Historically, our Areawide Pheromone and Sticky Trap monitoring for insects was terminated around the first of April as the produce season ended. Beginning 2 years ago however, we continued our Areawide Trapping Network throughout the summer to collect trapping data from all 16 areawide trap locations year-round. So why is this additional trapping data useful? For several reasons. First, understanding the activity of some of our key pests when produce is not grown during the summer may give us an indication of what to expect as the fall produce season begins. This may be particularly helpful for predicting moth flights and whitefly flights in August-September coinciding with early transplanting and direct seeded crops. Another example is keeping track of corn earworm which can unexpectedly show up near the beginning of fall harvests. Secondly, trapping for pests during the summer has shown us that 2 of our more important produce pests are not caught in traps during the summer. We presume this is due to the absence of brassica crops and weeds for diamondback moth, and high daytime/nighttime temperatures lethal to aphids. The fact that trap catches resume in the fall supports our conclusion that these pests are absent in the summer, only to reenter the desert via winds and/or transplants in the fall. And finally, it gives me something to do in the summer. So, visit the Areawide Summer Trap Network if you’re curious what our key pests are up to. We also continue to monitor thrips activity during the summer. This involves plant sampling using a dislodgement sampling method (beat pan) to determine the relative abundance of thrips adults and larvae on alfalfa, cotton, melons, wheat, Sudan grass, and weeds. This is being conducted to supplement our yellow sticky trap data that only indicates thrips adult flight movement an area. With this plant sampling we should be able to determine the primary host plants thrips are colonizing in the cropping season during the long hot summer. We are also trying to determine whether these crops allow for the reproduction of thrips. So far, all the crops and weeds we have sampled have shown that thrips will reproduce and complete their life cycle on them. This is important, particularly for weeds, as we are trying to determine whether INSV can be survive the summer in the absence of lettuce. It is also important because it allows us to determine potential exposure of thrips to key insecticides like Radiant and Lannate for resistance management purposes. These crops essentially serve as untreated refugia that likely sustains insecticide susceptibility and is the reason these products are still effective against thrips. We will be conducting this work throughout the summer, as well as through next produce season. We will periodically provide updates of these thrips monitoring results throughout the summer. As my dad used to say, “to solve the problem, you must first understand the problem”.
DISEASE: Center Rot of Onion
PATHOGEN: Pantoea ananatis, Pantoea agglomerans, Pantoea alli and Pantoea stewartii subsp. indologenes
HOSTS: Onion (Allium cepa L.), garlic (Allium sativum L.), shallots (Allium cepa var. aggregatum L.), leeks (Allium ampeloprasum L.), chives (Allium schoenoprasum L.).
Symptoms and signs
Center rot of onion has not been a major problem in the desert southwest but when the environment is favorable, the disease can cause up to 90% loss. Foliar symptoms (symptoms on leaves) may start with water-soaked lesions spanning the length of the leaf blade, which gradually become blighted resulting in desiccation and collapse of the tissue. Experiments have shown that the bacteria can move from leaves to the bulbs, thus protecting foliage is important to manage the disease.
The bacteria can overseason to infect onions in a number of different ways. Like many bacterial pathogens, P. ananatis can be seed-borne with infested seed serving as a survival mechanism as well as a means of dissemination. It has been demonstrated that P. ananatis can be both naturally seed-borne and seed-transmitted in onion. The significance of the bacterium's ability to colonize seed is uncertain, as most onion seed production sites are located in arid climates but extremely important to understand to manage the disease.
Although P. ananatis can be seedborne, the proposed primary mode of transmission is by two insect vectors. Two species of thrips, tobacco thrips (Frankliniella fusca (Hinds)) and onion thrips (Thrips tabaci), have the ability to transiently acquire and transmit P. ananatis and P. agglomerans . The bacterium can persist in a non-circulative manner in the gut of thrips for 128 h, allowing the vector to infect plants over an extended period of time.
P. ananatis can survive epiphytically and endophytically on a wide range of hosts. These alternative hosts can serve as a source of inoculum in fields where susceptible crops are grown. In Georgia alone, 25 weed species, including carpetweed (Mollugo verticillata), common ragweed (Ambrosia artemisiifolia), crabgrass (Digitaria sanguinalis), common cocklebur (Xanthium pensylvanicum), curly dock (Rumex crispus), Florida pusley (Richardia scabra), sicklepod (Cassia obtusifolia), stinkweed (Thlaspi arvense), Texas panicum (Panicum texanum), vaseygrass (Paspalum urvillei), wild radish (Brassica spp.), yellow nutsedge (Cyperus esculentus) and other multiple crop plants were found to harbor P. ananatis populations asymptomatically.
Controlling Fusarium Wilt of Lettuce Using Steam Heat – Trial Initiated
Earlier this week, we initiated a trial examining the use of band steam for controlling Fusarium wilt of lettuce. The premise behind this research is to use steam heat to raise soil temperatures to levels sufficient to kill soilborne pathogens. For Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. lactucae, the pathogen which causes Fusarium wilt of lettuce, the required temperature for control is generally taken to be > 140°F for 20 minutes. Soil solarization, where clear plastic is placed over the crop bed during the summer, exploits this concept. The technique raises soil surface temperatures to 150-155˚F, effectively killing the pathogen and reducing disease incidence by 45-98% (Matheron and Porchas, 2010).
In our trials, we are using steam heat to raise soil temperatures. Steam is delivered by a 35 BHP steam generator mounted on a custom designed elongated bed shaper (Fig. 1). Preliminary results were encouraging. The device was able to increase the temperature of the top 3” of soil to over 180°F at a travel speed of 0.5 mph as shown in this video of the machine in action (shown below). These temperatures exceed that of those known to control pathogens responsible for causing Fusarium wilt of lettuce (> 140°F for 20 minutes).
Stay tuned for final trial results and reports on the efficacy of using steam heat to control Fusarium wilt of lettuce.
If you are interested in evaluating the technique on your farm, please contact me. We are seeking additional sites with a known history of Fusarium wilt of lettuce disease incidence to test the efficacy and performance of the device.
References
Matheron, M. E., & Porchas, M. 2010. Evaluation of soil solarization and flooding as management tools for Fusarium wilt of lettuce. Plant Dis. 94:1323-1328.
Acknowledgements
This project is sponsored by USDA-NIFA, the Arizona Specialty Crop Block Grant Program and the Arizona Iceberg Lettuce Research Council. We greatly appreciate their support.
A special thank you is extended to Cory Mellon and Mellon Farms for allowing us to conduct this research on their farm.
Weeds are one of the most visible of all agricultural pests. They can’t move or hide and once established often stick up over the crop. Just one weed in a 10 acre field is annoying to look at. With insects and diseases, the damage is often more visible than the pest. That is not the case with weeds. A moderate weed infestation is approximately 10 weeds per square foot. If a herbicide produces 90% control, that leaves 1 weed per square foot or 43 weeds per acre. Without an untreated check, this can look like the herbicide failed! It is easy to leave an untreated spot in a field and it is well worth doing. Many applicators do so unintentionally because of skips, powerlines and other causes. They help determine crop injury and weed control. Here are some examples of what various levels of control looked like from one of our cole crop trials:
Corn earworm:
CEW moth counts are down areawide and average for this time of year.
Beet armyworm:
Trap counts decreased in most locations; about average compared to previous years.
Cabbage looper:
Cabbage looper counts increased in most traps and about average for this time of season.
Diamondback moth:
DBM moths continue to increase in all areas. Below average for this time of the year.
Whitefly:
Adult movement negligible, typical for early January.
Thrips:
Currently, numbers are about average compared with previous years.
Aphids:
Aphid movement increased significantly in the past two weeks, particularly in North Yuma and Gila Valleys. Well above average for early January.
Leafminers:
Adults decreased in most locations, but above average for January.