Georgia strawberry growers battling fungus

Many strawberry sites in Georgia are now suffering substantial plant mortality as the season progresses. Losses are not uniform, and some sites look pretty good. But unfortunately, many do not. If diseases continue to increase, this may be one of our worst production years ever. However, I hope that producers can still pull out some profits. From the beginning, some growers received substandard plants, and some of these were already showing early signs of disease — especially Phytophthora root rot and the aggressive strain of Neopestalotiopsis. I attended a winter strawberry meeting in Arkansas, and much of the discussion centered around the poor quality of plants coming in from Canada; poor quality was equated to substantial rain during the time that tips were being harvested. In a court of law, this amounts to nothing more than hearsay evidence, but I did hear it from reputable sources, and it would make sense. This article originally appeared in the University of Georgia’s ...