Diseases

Harvest time is not the time to determine if a disease affected your crop

  • October 30, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

It happens every year.
A field is about to be harvested and something is awry.  Perhaps the plants are lodged, ears are poorly filled, or pods shrunken.  What happened to my crop?
From a plant disease perspective, it is nearly impossible to provide any useful information to the producer.  Many pathogens that can cause crop diseases are also excellent saprophytes.  That means they utilize dead or dying plant tissues for nourishment.  Consequently, when plants prematurely senesce,…

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Late season tar spot- what is on the horizon?

  • September 4, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

There has been some chatter about tar spot starting up a bit in Northern Illinois corn fields.
However, crops are almost at R5 in many places.  What options do we have and what can you expect?  Check out our new post on the Illinois Field Crop Disease Hub by clicking here.  Remember to sign up at the website for updates and look forward to new materials such as factsheets, images, and guides by Spring,…

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Diagrams to help you rate foliar disease on corn

  • August 19, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

Many in the agricultural community, as well as researchers annually rate corn for disease as a means to assess hybrid response, hybrid effectiveness, or potential disease level on field productivity.  It can be difficult to rain the eye to accurately measure disease on foliage, and differences in the type and size of the structure or lesion associated with the pathogen varies significantly.  The four links below will direct you to disease area diagrams we developed in order to help you obtain accurate disease severity estimates in your fields.…

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New maps for tracking Southern rust in corn (repaired link)

  • July 14, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

Southern rust is caused by a fungal pathogen that does not overwinter in Illinois.  Instead, it blows in from warmer regions during the growing season.  When conditions favor spread and development of this disease significant damage can occur, especially if it arrives before tasseling (VT).  For more information on Southern rust, check out the Crop Protection Network publication by clicking here.  Yesterday our colleagues detected this disease in Southeast Missouri.  With the hurricane/tropical storm remnant pushing northward,…

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Avoid the cosmic freakout

  • July 13, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

Today colleagues in Indiana reported tar spot presence in some of their research plots located in North West IN.  They found an extremely low number of stroma (less than 10) when assessing approximately 500 feet of plots.  When you see or read about the report keep a few things to keep in mind:
1) The amount detected was exceptionally low, and not close to the widespread severity we saw early last year.  For example, on  July 5th,…

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RSVP for the Champaign Pest and Pathogen Field Day!

  • July 5, 2019

  • Nathan Kleczewski

Come to Champaign, Illinois on July 22nd for the first annual field crop Pest and Pathogen Field Day from 9am-noon.  Registration, doughnuts, and coffee will start at 8:30 am. Parking for the event will be available at the Agricultural and Biological Engineering farm on the UIUC South Farm Facility, located at 3603 South Race Street, Urbana, IL, 61802.  Click HERE to register.
Join us to walk research plots and learn about insect and disease identification in field crops,…

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