2018 ASVO Seminar; Frontline pest and disease management for healthy vineyards

 

Using agrochemical data to monitor trends and identify future issues Dr Paul Petrie, The Australian Wine Research Institute (AWRI)
Almost all grape growers maintain a spray diary to track pesticide use and ensure compliance with maximum residue limits. When aggregated the data from spray diaries offers the opportunity to benchmark spray programs between regions and season. While some of the trends are un-surprising, such as more fungicide being applied in cooler and wetter regions. The range of use patters across a region or between similar regions can also be very informative. In some cases, vineyards that could be adjacent to each other show a 20-30% difference in the number of fungicide applications. In another example; two regions in similar production zones are using quite different fungicide chemistries to control the same disease. Analysing spray programs offers a great opportunity to look over your neighbours’ fence to understand how your program compares to the rest of the industry and see if there is opportunity for improvement.