Today’s episode of the Orchard Outlook podcast is all about the annoying and persistent disease powdery mildew, folks. It’s there flagging shoots and curling leaves leading to some ghostly-looking Honeycrisp and Cortland trees. Today’s guests Dr. Kerik Cox and graduate student David Strickland are like ghost busters researching management strategies for tree fruit diseases like powdery mildew to bust away those white and fuzzy symptoms.

Guest: Dr. Kerik Cox is an associate professor in the School of Integrative Plant Science Plant Pathology and Plant-Microbe Biology Section at Cornell AgriTech. To address pain points for growers, he wields his pathology expertise to focus on antimicrobial resistance and very applied disease management. In his extension appointment, he also focuses on pesticide education and disease forecasting.

David Strickland is a Ph.D. candidate in Kerik’s program and his focus is apple powdery mildew. He’s investigating applied solutions for the management of this disease including field trials to explore efficacy and optimize fungicide applications and work on disease resistance.

Website: www.perennia.ca

Host: Michelle Cortens, Tree Fruit Specialist

Follow us on Twitter: @nsperennia @nstreefruit

Connect with us on: Instagram: @nsperennia Facebook: @nsperennia

Music: A Sunny Day by J. Tones

Logo Created by: Perennia Food and Agriculture Inc.

Email us at: info@perennia.ca