Canopy & Disease Management

Optimising cereal profitability in the high rainfall zone through the integrated of disease management and canopy management principles.

The last four seasons has seen a huge uptake in the principles underlying both canopy management and foliar fungicide disease control in Australian broad acre cereals, as a consequence many crops are now managed on a “tactical basis”, whereby expenditure decisions are moved from sowing to mid season. This has had substantial benefits in terms of matching inputs to seasonal outlook but comes with the need for a range of new decision support tools in order to optimize both water use efficiency and expenditure of nutrients and agrichemicals.

Evidence from the current project “SFS 15” indicates that when considering decision support tools for grower’s one size does not fit all. A key aspect of this project will be to produce a range of tactical management tools, supported by field trials data that enable growers to make better decisions on canopy and disease management, from the complex crop models through to hardcopy technical guidelines.

It is proposed that canopy and disease management principles used to manage inputs at stem elongation will be integrated in field trials with:

  • The potential use of crop sensors to “visualise” the need for applied nitrogen at stem elongation.
  • The integrated use of canopy management with wide rows and sowing date.Guidelines on the better use of Adult
  • Plant Resistance (APR) when using fungicides.
  • Construction of simple calculators for tactical N application
  • Linking fungicide use to soil water availability.

Previous GRDC funded research on canopy management and disease control has given cereal growers more confidence to delay decisions on nitrogen input and disease management until the stem elongation. The benefits of this have enabled growers to better match crop inputs with the seasonal outlook. This project aims to improve agrichemical margins, nitrogen and water use efficiency by providing a range of tools that use the crop canopy and the soil as the indicator for making better decisions at stem elongation.

Project outputs:

A diverse range of decision support tools based on new and established technologies that enable growers to make better decisions on the use of agrichemical products for disease and canopy managementGuidelines on the application of canopy management principles to other crops, specifically feed and malting barley, grazing wheat and canola.Dissemination of project results and tactical decision support tools through a national series of “soil 2 grain” workshops.

Useful links:


Enquiries, information and comments to:

Ben O'Connor,
Trainee Research Agronomist,
Southern Farming Systems
Ph. 03 5265 1685 or boconnor@sfs.org.au

 

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