BRANDON, Man. – The fusarium head blight disease which wreaked havoc with Manitoba cereal crops last year is gradually migrating west, officials with the Canadian Grain Commission say.
Strains of the disease were first identified in southern Manitoba and in irrigated areas of southern Alberta a decade ago. For the first time, it was identified in Saskatchewan fields last summer.
“It has been expanding gradually across southern Manitoba until now we have it growing on susceptible varieties of durum wheat in southern Saskatchewan,” biologist Louise Cooke said here last week.
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“There was so much moisture, the spores and moulds reproduced very quickly. That may have advanced the spread,” Cooke said. “We have it here and that’s all there is to it.”
Fusarium head blight causes what are called “tombstone kernels” – mouldy, bleached and shrivelled grain which can contain vomitoxin, a mycotoxin which makes the grain unfit for human consumption.
Weather and climate conditions are major factors affecting the disease’s impact on production and quality, said Randy Clear, a mycologist with the commission.
It’s unclear whether the disease could survive the dry zone through the Palliser Triangle. But moisture conditions across the northern Prairies – the so-called canola belt -Êare prime for the disease to thrive.
Prevention techniques
The best way farmers can manage their risk is through crop rotations and variety selection, Clear said.
Studies conducted at North Dakota State University last year found semi-dwarf wheats were more susceptible to the disease than the taller Canadian hard red spring wheat varieties.
“Marshall and Grandin have been found in particular to be more susceptible than hard red spring wheat varieties,” he said.
Durum varieties and Canada prairie spring varieties were also more susceptible than hard red spring varieties such as Katepwa.
But Clear said although some varieties were more susceptible than others, none was completely resistant.
