Skip to main content

Bud swell 2012


Two weeks of 80's and 70's surely moved things forward.  When I checked our Chardonnay buds last week, it was swelling, but was still tight, but now it looks like they are ready to go at any moment. (Note: these are 4-yr old young vines.  Also, sorry for out of focus pictures.  I forgot to take my camera with me yesterday.)

Hopefully, it will go well with a longer than usual growing season, and we end up having early harvest this year!!

The first disease to be concerned is, as usual, Phomopsis.  The best management strategy against Phomopsis is use of a protective fungicide such as mancozeb or captan, since we do not have any material with curative activity.

Also, since we had a warm dry early summer before Irene, many of us saw quite a bit of powdery mildew.  Chances are, we have a plenty of inoculum.  Although we do not typically see powdery mildew until later in the season, with this warm winter, I am not sure what will happen.  I know it is not the best IPM practice, but with given conditions, I think it is a good practice to tank-mix mancozeb with sulfur (2-3 lb/A) to have some insurance against early season powdery mildew.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Season's Greetings!

I hope you and your family have a good holiday season and a Happy (and safe) New Year! Thanks again for your support of our programs. Here are some recent media highlights. 😉 The link will open a new window. AHS AREC promotional video  that highlights some of our activities. The link did not work... It asks you to log in to VT. I will request the IT people to change the setting, but in a meantime, here's the same video. We also appeared in  the Library of Congress project “Winery Workers of Virginia”. One more announcement: I will be moving this blog to a new location ( ext.grapepathology.org ) early next year. I had to make a change due to the email subscription service, which has been terminated.  You do not need to change your bookmark or your email subscription. The URL will be forwarded to a new site and your email subscription has been moved to a new site already. 

Recent downy mildew risk events

 It seems that several rain events have happened over the course of the past two weeks or so. Here is a summary of recent downy mildew risk events, based on the NEWA stations and DMCast. Bristol, VA Fifteen days with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. The latest event happened last Sunday. Floyd, VA Eleven days with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. The last event happened last Friday. Charles City, VA Twelve days with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. The latest event happened yesterday. Central VA Since there was a wide variation among stations, I am listing several around Central VA. Tyro, VA Nine days with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. The latest event happened yesterday. Red Hill and Crozet, VA Only one day with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. Olympic Lake Thirteen days with potential DM infection event(s) since Sept 1. The latest event happened last Sunday. Washington, VA Eight days with potential DM infection event

A quick reminder for late-season disease management materials in preparation for Ida.

  In preparation for hurricane Ida, here is some information that you may find useful (This is a repeat of the previous post, but I received some emails asking for them.) 1)  List of short PHI fungicides for late-season diseases (will open a pdf file) 2)  Updated presentation from the last virtual field day (will open a pdf file). Recent downy mildew risks Many of us have been experiencing more rains lately than the past several months, here are a number of days with downy mildew risk events in the past two weeks based on the NEWA’s DMCast. Many of these rains have been sporadic in terms of area and time it covered, so, use these numbers as a guide. Bristol: 14 days (latest was on 8/30) Floyd: 9 days (latest was on 8/29) Charles City: 14 days (latest was on 8/30) Tyro: 7 days (latest was on 8/30) Red Hill: 5 days (latest was on 8/29) Washington: 8 days (latest was on 8/29) Winchester: 9 days(latest was on 8/29) It is probably a good idea to protect your vines against downy mildew in a