Mention “ powdery mildew ” to a cannabis grower and they turn white . remark the same words to a floriculture cultivator and all they can think of is how much pesticide spraying they ’ll have to do to eliminate the pathogen .
by Carl Silverberg
For many growers , the boastful expense is n’t the cost of the pesticide or underprice infected plant . It ’s the disbursement of shifting workers off from other chore for clear this trouble . With labor dearth becoming almost an epidemic itself , no one has the luxuriousness of repurposing stave from receipts - producing labor to taxation delivery chore .
One grower , Theodore Huggins , put it this way . “ I evidently ca n’t come in each solar day and do a thoroughgoing crop take the air through each home . I ’d never have clock time to do anything else . You have some alternative ; depute it to one of your assistant growers , do it yourself or find some other way to visit your crop on a daily foundation the way you want it done . ”
Zebra plants make up about 50 % of the tropic house at one of our customer ’s adeptness and during his practical harvest walking one aurora , the head grower thought he noticed what appear to be powdery mold in the nerve centre of his aphelandra crop . He had n’t left for work yet and soar up into that area using his cellphone app . He had experienced a similar problem a few months originally and the solution caused head ache , harvest loss , and unplanned expenses .
The head grower at that time did n’t react apace enough to the irruption and waited until he saw it on one of his full , analytical crop walks . He did n’t catch it until two week into the problem . That wait was vital . Instead of one nebulizer to 4,500 plants , the squad had to use a systemic antimycotic and then ply it through their full glasshouse .
The current school principal grower was not about to make the same fault as his precursor . Using a comprehensive greenhouse direction and monitoring system , the raiser survey the photos from that break of the day , pinpointed the area he thought was infect and noted that he cogitate powdery mildew might be on the crop in a particular section of the zone . He reexamine all the daily photos of that section for the preceding calendar week to see on the dot where the Powdery Mildew first appear .
“ It could be six hour , it could be six minutes , or twelve hours or twenty - four hours but I ’m going to discover out where that powdery mould started . Who was patient zero ? ”
Because he knew exactly where the pathogen was , as well as when and where it commence , he did n’t have to spray anywhere else . If you only have 4,500 square foot of zebra plants why spray all 9,000 plants in the nursery ?
“ I assigned a task to an employee , the time she needed to do it and I assigned the regimen for that harvest . The task was beam to her immediately and she knew that instead of doing her normal piece of work schedule , she ’s going to come in and do this . I did n’t have to talk to her , I did n’t have to have a meeting with her , I did n’t have to have any lengthy deliberations or discussion . It contract me all of two minutes . ”
There were two contiguous wallop of his discovering the pathogen before it overspread to the other plants . First , he saved interminable hours of impress Labour from planned job to emergency task . Second , the act of pesticides he had to use was greatly reduced . This had both a financial as well as environmental welfare .
The grower summarized his feelings .
“ This translate into horticulture as well as marihuana , where you have to be very careful about any pesticides . People who do n’t deal their Labor Department and do n’t do their crop take the air effectively and do n’t catch a disease early , well , they terminate up paying for it in unmediated pecuniary value and collateral labor time value . It killed me to see all those hours lose with the other infection . ”
For more information : iUNUCarl SilverbergSr . VP Outreach & Public Affairs202 320 9797[email protected]iunu.com
