- (Public Value) UCANR: Safeguarding abundant and healthy food for all Californians
- Author: Lynn Wunderlich
UC Cooperative Extension, UCIPM, and the Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team, with support from California's Department of Pesticide Regulation (DPR) Pest Management Alliance grants program, have developed a comprehensive online course for calibrating air blast sprayers!
Co-authored by myself and my colleague Franz Niederholzer, UCCE Farm Advisor in Colusa/Sutter/Yuba counties, this unique course is for anyone involved in spray decision making in perennial crops (trees and vines). Calibration is the process of setting up, maintaining, and rechecking a desired spray volume, measured in gallons per acre. It is the basis for a safe and effective pesticide application and is used by every grower-conventional to organic-who uses pesticides in their crop to help manage pests.
The course is organized into 5 modules:
- Why proper calibration is critical for your operation's success.
- Equipment: Parts of an axial fan* air blast sprayer.
- The calibration formula-how to measure the variables and do the math.
- Spray drift: droplet size, fan speed, weather, and how to manage.
- Spray team communication.
*We are working on a venturi (air-shear) sprayer module option which should be available soon.
- 2.5 California DPR CE credits have been approved (2.0 other, 0.5 laws). You must complete all of the course modules and pass the final exam with at least 70% to receive your CEUs.
With the support of DPR's Pest Management Alliance grants, this course is now available for FREE, until December 31, 2020.
You must have an account first in eXtension campus (available without
- Author: Lynn Wunderlich
The Daane lab joins Houston Wilson and other researchers on a nationwide search to confirm the three cornered alfalfa treehopper as a red blotch vector and/or identify other insects that are spreading the disease. Part of that work includes sampling for suspect insects using the D-vac and yellow sticky traps in vineyards where red blotch spread is evident. The trap count information is used to understand the life cycles of these potential vectors. Wilson, who was one of several speakers covering red blotch research progress during my 2020 Foothill Grape Day, recently published a newsletter on his work of the seasonal ecology of the treehopper in North Coast vineyards. Our foothill monitoring will help us understand if the insect's life cycle is similar here as compared to what is known to occur in the cooler N. Coast.
And no, those vineyard fall colors are not a good thing! This is the time of the year when GRBaV symptoms become evident in red varieties in the vineyard-the characteristic red "blotches" on the leaves for which the disease is named begin to show in summer and become more visible as harvest nears and the season progresses. (Note: the disease affects both white and red varieties. In whites, the "blotches" are yellow and more difficult to see). While diseased vineyards turn red, healthy vines remain green, then gold, in fall.
Thanks to the hard work of those like McCalla and Flores, even during this time of the pandemic (and wearing masks while working outdoors in summer heat is not fun, let me tell you), we will get closer to solving the red blotch mystery.