By Clint Thompson
Persistent rains in recent weeks have Georgia pecan producers concerned about scab disease with harvest season looming.
Lenny Wells, University of Georgia (UGA) Extension pecan specialist, discussed disease development which spiked concerns following excessive rains during the first week in August.
“(The rain) probably causes more problems than solutions right now. The biggest issue over the last week is, everybody has already been fighting scab all year long and when you have a week like this where those nuts are sizing; they’ve already got a little scab and then have a week where you have rain every day and it doesn’t get time to dry off and they can’t get out there to spray, that just allows the scab to run wild,” Wells said.
“That’s one issue that it’s caused. Most everybody jumped back out there as quick as they could when it did start to let up to try to get them covered.”
“We’re getting close to the end of our fungicide sprays. We’re about at shell hardening now for most varieties. This was right at the tail end of the sprays we needed to get on, so that’s an issue.”
Background
Scab is a fungal disease that infects the leaves or nuts of pecan trees. If scab impacts the nut early enough in the production season, it can cause the nut to blacken and fall from the tree. It excels on trees that have received moisture which has been the case in recent weeks throughout the Southeast.
According to the UGA Weather Network, Tifton, Georgia, received 3.53 inches of rainfall from Aug. 2 to Aug. 9. Albany, Georgia, received 4.06 inches during that same timeframe while Cordele, Georgia, received 3.06 inches.