FARMERS can now download the 2024 editions of the cereal and pulse disease guides to help make informed decisions around disease management.

Agriculture Victoria’s plant pathology research leader, Dr Joshua Fanning, said the release of the updated disease guides complements advice from Agriculture Victoria on disease management activities.

“The 2024 Cereal Disease Guide and 2024 Pulse Disease Guide rank susceptibility of new and commonly grown grains such as wheat, barley, oats, lentils, faba bean and chickpea,” he said.

“Growers should consult the current guides for the latest ratings and definitions to plan disease management activities to prevent yield losses this season.

“Disease ratings are the first and most important step in managing disease so it’s important to understand the latest resistance ratings of varieties.

“In susceptible varieties disease can develop quickly and require greater management.

“Particularly diseases like stripe rust and Septoria in wheat, net blotches in barley, and botrytis in pulses which have been of concern over the last few years.”

Agriculture Victoria cereal pathologist, Dr Hari Dadu, said a particular concern in cereals in 2024 was the emergence of fungicide resistance to Fluxapyroxad (Systiva®, Group 7) in barley net form net blotch.

“In addition to this new resistance in Victoria we have resistance to multiple fungicide groups, including some triazole (DMI, Group 3) and strobilurin (Qol, Group 11) fungicides in wheat powdery mildew, and some triazole fungicides in barley net form net blotch,” he said.

“To reduce the chances of fungicide resistance continuing to develop, integrated disease management is required, including growing resistant varieties, avoiding growing the same crop in succession, spraying fungicides only when required and rotating fungicide groups.”

The 2024 Cereal Disease Guide and 2024 Pulse Disease Guides are available on the Agriculture Victoria website and from AppleBooks at: go.vic.gov.au/3IYyj7J and go.vic.gov.au/3Z8nRPy