Increased profits from disease-free garlic planting stock

Education and Training: extension, on-farm/ranch research, workshop
Farm Business Management: risk management
Pest Management: cultural control, eradication, integrated pest management, mulches - killed
Production Systems: general crop production

Proposal abstract:

Garlic is a profitable crop for hundreds of small to medium-sized vegetable farmers in all 16 counties in Maine. The contribution to farm income from garlic is disproportionably large when compared to the area planted. There is no seed scheme present and many garlic growers produce garlic bulbs for table use as well as garlic bulbs for seed. Importation of seed stock and exchange of live plant material has contributed to new pathogens being imported and distributed in Maine. Two previously unreported pathogens have been imported on garlic seed stock. Because growers need pathogen-free seed garlic to be sustainable, garlic will be put into tissue culture and brought garlic out of tissue culture at the University of Maine Arthur Shur Tissue Culture Facility. Garlic seed stock free from pathogens will be produced. The resultant pathogen-free planting stock will then be field grown by garlic farmers in Maine and Massachusetts. The tissue-culture generated garlic seed stock will be assessed against traditionally produced garlic seed stock. The farmer-grown replicated trials will be duplicates of those performed on the University of Maine Aroostook Research Station. In this proposal, several grower workshops and twilight meetings on identification and management of garlic pests and diseases will be presented. Follow up grower workshops on growing great garlic pathogen-free garlic bulbs will be presented. The project leader is Steve Johnson who an Extension Professor and Crops Specialist with the University of Maine Cooperative Extension where he has been employed for the past 22 years. He has supervised the Maine Seed Potato tissue culture lab and is a co-investigator in an applied garlic research project and co-investigator in an outreach program to garlic growers. Also leading the project is Dave Fuller, an Agriculture Professional with the University of Maine Cooperative Extension where he has been employed for the past 13 years. He has been growing garlic and teaching workshops on growing garlic for over 15 years. He is a co-investigator in an applied garlic research project and co-investigator in an outreach program to garlic growers. As a result of this proposal, 100 farmers will recognize major garlic diseases and realize their importance in garlic production and 30 farmers will adopt the new technique of planting pathogen-free garlic bulbs and their crop losses from introduced pathogens will be eliminated as will the spreading these pathogens through their seed sales.

Performance targets from proposal:

Milestones

YEAR 1
September 2011
100 Maine garlic growers will receive material on an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

October 2011
1000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs will be planted by three key garlic growers. One grower is from Massachusetts and two are from Maine. These growers will monitor the pathogen-free garlic planting and compare it to their traditional planting.

November 2011
100 Maine garlic growers will receive material on an intense workshop on Growing Healthy Garlic. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend an intense workshop on Growing Healthy Garlic. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

August 2012
Garlic crop is harvested from the planting of 1000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs. These growers will commit to measuring the yield and dollar impact of the pathogen-free garlic planting compared to their traditional planting.

YEAR 2
September 2012
An additional 100 Maine and Massachusetts garlic growers will receive material on an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

October 2012
2000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs are used for planting by three key garlic growers. One grower is from Massachusetts and two are from Maine. These growers will monitor the pathogen-free garlic planting and compare it to their traditional planting.

November 2012
An additional 100 Maine and Massachusetts garlic growers will receive material on an intense workshop on Growing Healthy Garlic. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend an intense workshop on Growing Healthy Garlic. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

January 2013
An additional 100 Maine and Massachusetts garlic growers will receive material on garlic production from pathogen-free bulbs, 25 will attend the workshop where preliminary findings are presented.

July 2013
An additional 100 Maine garlic growers will receive material on two twilight meetings on identification and management of garlic pests and diseases. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend a twilight meetings on identification and management of garlic pests and diseases. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

August 2013
Garlic crop is harvested from the planting of 2000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs. These growers will commit to measuring the yield and dollar impact of the pathogen-free garlic planting compared to their traditional planting.

YEAR 3
September 2013
An additional 100 Maine and Massachusetts garlic growers will receive material on an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend an intense workshop on Identification and Management of Garlic Pests and Diseases. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

October 2013
2000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs are used for planting by three key garlic growers. One grower is from Massachusetts and two are from Maine. These growers will monitor the pathogen-free garlic planting and compare it to their traditional planting.

November 2013
Assessment, verification, and data collection from key growers and from workshop growers on dollar sales increases and pounds of yield increase as a result of using pathogen-free garlic bulbs.

January 2014
An additional 100 Maine and Massachusetts garlic growers will receive material on garlic production from pathogen-free bulbs, 25 will attend the workshop where preliminary findings are presented.

July 2014
An additional 100 Maine garlic growers will receive material on two twilight meetings on identification and management of garlic pests and diseases. Of these 100 growers, 25 will attend a twilight meetings on identification and management of garlic pests and diseases. Ten of these growers will change their management strategies and commit to measuring the impacts of their management change.

August 2014
Garlic crop is harvested from the planting of 1000 pathogen-free garlic bulbs. These growers will commit to measuring the yield and dollar impact of the pathogen-free garlic planting compared to their traditional planting.

WRAP UP
September 2014
Pathogen-free bulbs are available to garlic growers.

October 2014
Assessment, verification, and data collection from key growers and from workshop growers on dollar sales increases and pounds of yield increase as a result of using pathogen-free garlic bulbs.

November 2014
Assessment, verification, and data collection from key growers and from workshop growers on dollar sales increases and pounds of yield increase as a result of using pathogen-free garlic bulbs.

January 2015
Completed information from the project findings will be presented to interested New England garlic growers. Information from the project findings will be distributed throughout the region through fact sheets and conference presentations including the Maine Agricultural Trades Show and the New England Vegetable and Berry Growers Conference as the opportunity arises.

Performance Target
One hundred garlic farmers will recognize major garlic diseases and realize their importance in garlic production. Twenty-five garlic farmers will adopt the new technique of planting pathogen-free garlic bulbs to eliminate introduced pathogens. These twenty-five growers will increase their returns by $4000 per acre.

Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the view of the U.S. Department of Agriculture or SARE.