DOIG Disease Modelling Project

This season with supporting funds from the Donnybrook Orchard Improvement Group, Pomewest and Stonefruit WA will be undertaking a disease modelling project running the decision support system RIMpro for black spot, powdery mildew in apples, pear scab and brown rot for stone fruit.

The project will involve setting up a network of weather stations that are able to run the RIMpro disease modelling support system and conducting a series of workshops to improve the understanding of these diseases and enable better preventative and control measures of diseases.  Horticultural advisor Marcel Veens will be our guest presenter at the workshops in August and November.  Plant Pathologist from the DPIRD Bunbury office, Andrew Taylor will be providing pathology support throughout the project.  This project is all about keeping the WA industry clean and disease pressure to a minimum, to retain our good biosecurity status.

RIMpro is a decision support system that models a wide range of pests and diseases of fruit trees. The tool is based on disease models developed and tested by scientists in production regions around the world. Growers connect their weather stations to the system, and RIMpro’s models use the localized weather forecasts to simulate disease development in the coming hours and days. This assists in decisions over management of diseases, for instance, whether the risk is high enough to warrant a fungicide application or whether it can be postponed for a future time.

To run the decision support system growers will need to have weather station set up in the orchard that is monitoring; temperature, relative humidity, rainfall, wind speed/direction, solar radiation and two leaf wetness sensors, one inside and one outside the canopy.

For more information on diseases contact DPIRD Plant Pathologist Andrew Taylor

For more information about RIMpro or to subscribe please contact Marcel Veens

For more information about the Metos weather stations with leaf wetness sensors contact Sam Eyres