Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

(Please see attached file below for the annual report.) 

Minutes of the NCERA 137 – Soybean Diseases Technical Committee Meeting

March 3, 2020 

Administrative Advisor:  Dr. Marty Draper, Kansas State University 

Chair:  Dr. Carl Bradley, University of Kentucky 

Secretary:  Dr. Darcy Telenko, Purdue University 

Immediate Past Chair:  Dr. Travis Faske, University of Arkansa

Members and guests in attendance in person and on Zoom (38 total), see Participants Section. 

The meeting of the NCERA 137 Soybean Disease Committee was held in Pensacola Beach, Florida at the Hilton Hotel on March 3, 2020. The meeting began at 8:30 AM with Dr. Carl Bradley welcoming attendees, followed by brief introductions of everyone in attendance.

Dr. Marty Draper provided an administrative update, which included an explanation of multi-state projects and a USDA-NIFA budget update, 1998 Farm Bill – 25% of funds expended on multi-state activities. Dr. Draper mentioned that the NCERA 137’s renewal/review was last year, and that the renewal was well-received. Dr. Draper encouraged the group to seek research opportunities that could be conducted through the NCERA 137 committee. Station directors in region are very supportive of what the group is doing. National committees organized by a region, join from any region or foreign countries, etc. where there is a collaborative interest.

NC- Research – hatch dollars; ERA – Extension and Research Activities; CC – coordinated committees (information exchange); DC – development committees (planning for NC or ERA); Rapid Response – “500”, AC – Administrative committees – department heads serve on and review projects; NRSP – National research support project – the North central region has more projects than any other region. Crop based committees are few, as with crop disease committees, a majority animal science based. Intent on committees is to build collaboration, leverage facilities, etc, project members for grant and P&T review. 

Committee appointment is by your AES director, more than one person can be on committee from a university. Administrative advisor – authorize meeting after annual report submitted, attend and direct committee to funding opportunities, editors to projects. A new committee only needs three Experiment stations for support. There is an Excellence in multistate research award - $15,000 - last year’s winner came from NC less likely for another. $5000 for two people to APO meeting to receive award. Report from 5-year performance period. 2-years from renewal to get the award together of the 6-year renewal. 4-page format of the award. Added value and synergistic activity, external funding leverage. Need to emphasis research, as Extension is well covered. 

NIFA update: One person left as national program leads. Ann Litchens-Park (molecular programs), paneling programs, but no one to push money out. Still clearing up awards from last year. Two documents from USDA on strategic approach to align public and private research efforts. Data collection and recording and updating the system (REEport being replaced), will mesh with annual report with stations and Extension – all built on one platform. USDA Science Blueprint handout. Dramatic change from past operations.

Explanatory Notes – tells what NIFA intends to fund.

National Science Liaisons – in DC only four left, Mathieu Ngouajio – crop production, organic ag, primary author of systems information – talk to Mathieu may provide good advice.

Budget – USDA-NIFA: landgrant.org (for more information) total increase to NIFA. Numerous decreases for many programs. AFRI increased. Budget control act of 2011 (sequestration) only a small amount of space to increase budget. CARET/AHS in DC currently speaking to congressional delegations. Seven priorities capacity funding and AFRI.

Representatives of each state in attendance provided brief state reports. State reports were provided by Alabama, Arkansas, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nebraska, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Tennessee, and Wisconsin.  In addition, a report for Ontario, Canada was provided by Albert Tenuta. These reports provided information about soybean production for the state in 2019 as well as important diseases that affected soybean yields in each state. 

Common themes included late planting across the region and decline in acreage in a number of states. New and emerging/re-emerging diseases reported included southern stem canker, taproot decline, target spot, fungicide-resistant strains of the pathogens that cause frogeye leaf spot and brown spot (Cercospora sojina and Septoria glycines, respectively). In addition, many “typical” diseases/pathogens also were observed, which included brown stem rot, bacterial blight, bacterial pustule, Cercospora leaf blight, Phytophthora root rot, root-knot nematode, Sclerotinia stem rot, soybean cyst nematode, and sudden death syndrome. 

Individual presentations were provided by some attendees:

Joe Laforest gave an update on “Soybean rust mapping and other mapping resources available.”  Nathan Kleczewski gave a presentation on “Developing a tool to detect Phytophthora sojae pathotypes from soil.” Dan McDonald gave a presentation on “Air sampling for foliar disease pathogens.” Daren Mueller gave an update on the Crop Protection Network.

Sam Markell gave an update on the General Soybean Production and Disease Status Report for Minnesota – 2019.

In 2019, soybean was harvested on 6.8 million acres in Minnesota over the production area that extends from the Iowa to Canadian borders. The average yield across the state was 44 bu/ acre.  The acreage harvested and yield per acre were down significantly compared to 2018. Many parts of Minnesota were exceptionally wet and cool in the spring and early summer, which resulted in delayed planting and slow plant growth. Disease incidence and severity were variable over this large area. The most common and significant diseases reported were white mold, sudden death syndrome, brown stem rot, pod and stem blight, an frogeye leaf spot.  Other common diseases, albeit minor in most cases, were bacterial blight, bacterial pustule, and seedling diseases.

SCN Coalition. The Coalition was launched in 2018 and included support from USB, NCSRP, private partners (7-8 companies). SCN Coalition outreach had 18.2 million impressions. Future work was successful with NCSRP, but not USB – funded farmer tour portion. August at ISU before Farm Progress, and second in winter/national SCN conference –Savannah GA. Pre-proposals were submitted to USB – 3 were submitted – 1 no for media outreach/1 unknown/Carl’s yes – support for universities on local level to talk about SCN. Full proposal being developed Carl will be contacting for budgets, etc.

Carl Bradley gave an update on mapping fungicide resistance in Cercospora sojina. Map of confirmed counties with QoI-resistance in C. sojina (2010) - 19 states with 311 counties/parishes. Carl Bradley is maintaining the list of confirmed counties and his lab is willing to help confirm in other locations. The following labs are maintaining the lists for fungicide resistance tracking:

• Cercospora sojina – maintained by Carl Bradley
• Septoria glycines – maintained by Carl Bradley
• Cercospora kikuchiis/flagellaris – maintained by Trey Price
• Corynoespora cassiicola – maintained by??
• Rhizoctonia solani – maintained by Trey Price

Some future guidelines for fungicide screening: designating hub labs and standardizing protocols; Identifying who needs isolates/regional projects; Need for timely requests and standard sampling protocols were discussed.  

Joe Laforest update on soybean rust mapping also included an update on EDDmaps and iPiPE.

EDDmaps – 2005, data sharing platform working with other groups, clearing house for tools such as iPiPE – avoid entering data twice, respect data privacy.

Eddmaps – early detection, verification, projects, alerts, data sharing and collaboration, visualization, and monitoring and management.

iPiPE and EDDMaps merging – pest introduction (EDDnaps) to models and management (iPiPE). Four core strategies 1. Data aggregation, 2. Data warehouse, 3. Produce maps, 4. Development of modeling platform for public and private sector researchers. In 2020, there are 19 commodity programs and 8 pest programs. One set of tools is available from other programs – text alerts like downy mildew, sentinel plot monitoring, etc. Each group tells needs and they try to meet those. Farm Dog, Naturalist, myFields, Ag Pest Monitoring, Pest Watch – data is all flowing into EDDmaps. In-season reporting – county pest status, sightings (phone report at location), monitoring sites (repeated measures), bulk data from previous seasons are all available. 

Daren Mueller - CPN update on multi-state Extension products – publications. There are big changes – 2019 new webpage (3^rd version), encyclopedia of all diseases – missing tap root decline, update if you see gaps. Crop disease loss calculator using disease loss estimated from 1996 for interactive loss information. Moving forward with a webinar series (3-4 in 2020), publication type research update from a recent publication to make an Extension version, every publication will include 5-10 questions for CCA credits. If you have new ideas on publications, etc. reach out to CPN. New advisory team was established for future guidance (Loren Geisler, Marty Draper, Joe LaForest, and Courtney Gallop) 

Business meeting. 

Minutes from the last meeting were sent out prior; there were no objections. Minutes were approved.

Daren Mueller volunteered to be the next Secretary, and nominations were closed. Albert Tenuta volunteered to continue as local arrangements contact.

Discussion of the next meeting location and date occurred. The consensus appeared to be having the meeting in association with the Southern Soybean Disease Workers (SSDW) again in 2021 at the same location (Hilton Hotel, Pensacola Beach, FL). Kaitlyn Bissonnette motioned to maintain the location and Tom Allen 2^nd the motion. The date will be similar to years past the first Tuesday in March, March 2, 2021. Dr. Darcy Telenko (chair) will follow up with the SSDW and NCERA 137 members later in the year about the 2021 meeting. 

Other discussion/new business:

Carl Bradley inherited the SBR sentinel list serve (Don Hershmann) do we continue it? It was decided to end the SBR list serve as the NCIPM center can convert communications into Basecamp for no cost.

2021 IPM symposium – session ideas?

Fungicide resistance topic in field crops – Carl Bradley will pursue.

Put new job opportunities on state reports – Darcy Telenko will compile.

Next renewal of NCERA-137 is in 2024.

Meeting was adjourned at 5:00 PM.

Respectfully submitted, Darcy Telenko