VegNET NT has had a great focus on Integrated Pest Management (IPM) this quarter. In September this year Soil Wealth ICP project officers Umberto Calvo and Issabella Elmers came up to the Northern Territory (NT) to deliver a workshop on pest and nutrition management for vegetable growers, alongside VegNET NT. The workshop looked to local experts to deliver topical information to local vegetable growers. The workshop started off with Senior Entomologist Dr Brian Thistleton from the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries NT who, alongside his team has done extensive research and trials on IPM. Brian showed the attendees what the common pests we see on NT’s common vegetable crops look like up close and then showed the common beneficial insects (beneficials) for that pest that are naturally in the area. Brian went through the key principles of IPM, exploring the relationship between beneficials and pests and the issues growers will come up against when they kill their beneficials when choosing broad spectrum insecticide use to manage the pests. This then highlighted the true value of IPM methods of pest control such as biological, cultural and IPM friendly chemical controls. The day also covered chemical resistance, and the importance of correct chemical use.

Next up was Callum Hutcheson, a Senior Agronomist for Elders based in Darwin, who focused on nutritional management of common vegetable crops in the greater Darwin region. Callum took the audience through the key elements of nutritional management, common mistakes he sees in regard to nutritional management that could be impeding production or profitability, and management tools to consider to maximise productivity and profitability whilst providing consistent produce each year.

The day finished with the distributing of some key resources. After identifying an industry need, VegNET NT has recently produced a pesticide use spray diary that meets the recording requirements for pesticide applications under the Ag Vet Control of use Regulations NT. The booklet is simple in its lay out, has examples of how to fill it in and is in both English and Vietnamese to cater to the vegetable industry demographic of the outer Darwin region specifically. The booklet is predicted to increase compliance in pesticide recording requirements and has shown to be a welcomed available resource.

The second piece of extension material that VegNET officer Mariah Maughan went through was the newly developed IPM treatment wheels, designed to help growers better understand what insecticides impact beneficial insects as well as what pests have commercially available beneficials to purchase. Each treatment wheel is for a specific crop (in this example – okra) and contains the most common pests that impact that crop. Under these segments it has common insecticides growers can use for that pest on that specific crop, and they are colour coded green, orange and red according to their impact on beneficial insects-their IPM ‘friendliness’. The concept of an IPM treatment wheel has been successful as an extension tool as it has been specifically designed to be user-friendly, moving away from the standard table format, and is crop specific. The treatment wheels will be updated annually to ensure all insecticide options are still appropriate and to account for new insecticides on the market.

The workshop along with VegNET’s new extension materials have been a great support for growers to not only get the most out of their crop by improving pest and nutritional management, but to also have a greater understanding of the short and long-term positive results that IPM systems can achieve for growers.

FIND OUT MORE
Please contact Mariah Maughan on 0417 618 468 or email ido@ntfarmers.org.au