News Priorities project

Future focus

A look to the year ahead

After harvest each year, it’s time to let everybody know about our plans for field day activities for the coming year.

This time it will be a little different as the current Hort Innovation funded DFA extension program finishes at the end of this financial year.

Given the end of the project is near, we actually made a start on this year’s program even before harvest began. In late January we had two significant events.

The first was a trial and field walk addressing the issue of late-season Botrytis control.

With help from NuFarm, we set up demonstrations on two properties on the use of Botector, a biological fungicide that can be used right up until harvest.

The key issues are that this product is completely different from any chemical spray we have used previously for the control of Botrytis.

It contains another very specific and much less damaging fungus that actually takes up all of the sites that botrytis would normally grow on.

This means that it must be in place before Botrytis starts to grow. You really only need to target the fruit with spray application, the product must be stored and used in a certain range of climatic conditions and it must not be used with some chemicals that can impede the Botector fungus.

In both the sprayed and unsprayed blocks, there really wasn’t any significant botrytis so for the demonstration this was a bit of a disappointment. However, the event was really valuable for those attending as they had an update on whole-of-season Botrytis control from Dr Bob Emmett, and a chance to discuss how to use Botector with the NuFarm representative.

Our second event for the year was a research, development and extension planning forum. The forum included a cross-section of 22 industry participants, which was pleasing and manageable given the COVID-19 restrictions in place at the time. It was really pleasing to include representatives from Hort Innovation in the process.

The three major themes developed during the day were;

1. New equipment and automation

2. New trellis design and management systems

3. Education and training

These are now being developed in more detail to fit into potential new project applications for the industry. Thanks to all who participated.

The project took a break for harvest and now we are looking forward to activities for the remainder of the financial year.

We are still working through our trials on the use of Chlormequat on currants and will report back after our expert panel reviews the data.

The final collection of benchmarking data and a review of the past three years will soon take place. Participants will identify key messages that we will share with the industry.

We will also be able to keep industry up-to-date with outcomes from our mechanical pruning development project.

Finally, we will have a display at the Mildura Field Days, so see you there if not before. v

Stuart Putland Dried Fruits Australia field officer 03 5023 5174 projects@driedfruitsaustralia.org.au