Irrigated Wheat: Disease Management in Irrigated Wheat

Key Points:

• Irrigating wheat increases green leaf retention in the crop canopy, potentially increasing disease pressure where cultivars are susceptible.
• Fungicide application is unlikely to be profitable on varieties with resistance ratings of moderately resistant (MR ) or resistant (R) unless disease pressure is high due to neighbouring susceptible (S) crops.
• Disease ratings are an excellent guide but each crop needs to be managed according to disease levels in the paddock.
• Use fungicides to keep the top three leaves of the crop plants (flag, flag-1 and flag-2) free from disease to maximise green leaf area during grain-fill.
• The timing and number of fungicide sprays will depend on disease pressure and onset, but in general, fungicides need to be applied between first node to booting (GS31 to GS45) to protect the top three leaves of the crop canopy.

• Irrigated Wheat: Disease Management in Irrigated Wheat (PDF 0.8 mb)