A sudden outbreak of crop disease can be deadly to the plants and costly for the farmer.
But a CQUniversity-led research project is looking at the connection between environmental conditions and levels of disease causing spores, as a way of predicting an outbreak in crops before they occur.
Dr Alison Jensen is a plant pathologist coordinating the study as part of Bundaberg's Hinkler AgTech Initiative and has been investigating the impact of downy mildew on basil crops in the Wide Bay and Biloela regions.
"We're currently working with the Botanical Food Company and herb growers to develop improved strategies for management of downy mildew, which can cause potentially devastating yield loss in basil crops," Alison said.
"As part of this project, we monitor when and where downy mildew occurs and use AgTech for automated measurement of factors that contribute to disease development, such as environmental conditions and the concentration of airborne spores.
"We can then use this data to develop a predictive model, based on the historical conditions that lead to disease outbreaks, to estimate the likelihood of a disease outbreak in future."
Downy mildew is caused by a fungal-like microorganism that spreads rapidly via airborne spores and has the potential to prevent yield losses, and in severe cases devastate a crop.
Using an automated spore trap, that appears like a small weather station, Dr Jensen collects the microbes from the field or orchard and then uses the data in comparison to environmental conditions.
Just like a farmer would prepare for a forecast weather event, when patterns emerge it is believed it could be possible to foresee a disease outbreak and take preventative action.
"Diseases like downy mildew can move very quickly, so the benefit of having a very accurate disease prediction model means growers can be more proactive about how they manage the disease," she said.
"They can use this forecast to predict when an outbreak may occur and apply fungicides strategically rather than seasonally.
"It saves money, it's beneficial for the environment and you can end up with much better disease control as well."
While the project remains in its early stages Dr Jensen said growers have been "enthusiastic" about the data collected so far and what it means for how they approach disease in the future.
The project is also studying disease predictive modelling in ground-based strawberry crops and macadamia orchards.
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