BY CLARE STANFIELD
GETTING A HANDLE ON THE
SITUATION
While certain wheat varieties have some
tolerance to FHB, there is only one with
full resistance, Canterra’s AC Emerson,
so producers must manage for the dis-
ease in order to meet quality standards.
And those standards are high, because
deoxynivalenol (DON), the mycotoxin
produced by FHB, is harmful to human
and animal health, and can render a crop
unsellable.
“Customers are expecting a certain
quality in our grain,” said Daryl Be-
switherick, program manager, quality
assurance standards and reinspection,
for the Canadian Grain Commission in
Winnipeg. “All shipments of grain leaving
Canada must be inspected by the Grain
Commission so we can ensure the shipper
is getting what they’ve agreed to buy.”
Canada’s official grading guide sets out
FHB limits for all classes of wheat and
cereal grains, and they are low. In Canada
Western Red Spring, for example, which
accounts for over half of the wheat grown
in Canada, No. 1 can have no more than
0.25 per cent Fusarium-damaged kernels.
No. 2 is 0.8 per cent, and No. 3 is 1.5 per
cent. In malting barley of all stripes, it’s
even lower at 0.2 per cent.
Beswitherick said that the average FHB
level in Canadian shipments has remained
relatively stable over the last few years.
“It hasn’t grown by leaps and bounds,”
he said. “But it does fluctuate from year
to year, and we are seeing it move west.
Farmers in Alberta should definitely try
to keep it out if they can—if you talk to
Manitoban producers, a lot of their grain
is downgraded because of FHB.”
The results of Harding’s survey will help
Alberta growers get a clearer picture of
the state of FHB in the province. It builds
on earlier surveys done in 2001-03, 2005
and 2010-11.
The new survey is extensive. Ag field-
men and Alberta Agriculture and Forestry
staff will randomly select 900 fields across
all cereal-growing regions and take 500
heads from each one. The heads will then
be dried, threshed and sent to the Canadi-
an Grain Commission to be tested. “The
lab tests will determine the Fusarium
strain, if there is one, and the amount of
toxin,” said Harding.
He said that past surveys have revealed
a pattern. “
Fusarium graminearum
is easy
to find on wheat and corn in the irrigated
areas of southern Alberta. That’s not to say
it’s wall to wall, but generally speaking, it’s
well-established there,” he said. “North of
[Highway 1], it’s more difficult to find. So
it’s there, but [it] may not be permanently
established just yet.”
But lab tests reveal a troubling change
in the pathogen itself. Harding explained
that, as with any biological organism,
Fusarium graminearum
is subtly adapting
by developing a new chemotype—one that
is a more aggressive pathogen and pro-
duces a higher level of DON. “One of the
biggest reasons this survey is so important
is to track these types of changes,” he said.
Of the current survey, Harding said
he doesn’t expect to see much change
in southern Alberta. “But we’ve been
hearing that seed-testing labs are finding
higher levels of seed-borne
Fusarium
graminearum
in other parts of the prov-
ince as well,” he said. “We don’t know yet
if that means it’s becoming more com-
mon elsewhere, but it wouldn’t come as
a terribly big surprise, because the path-
ogen is certainly capable of expanding
to all cereal-producing areas of Alberta.
We would like to prevent that, or slow it
down as best we can.”
How? Most producers already know the
basics—not planting infected seed, using
certified seed when possible, and mini-
mizing the movement of infected seed and
straw. Harding said Alberta’s
Fusarium
graminearum
management plan is a good
place for anyone to start.
Larocque said that his positive DNA tests
have increased vigilance on his farm and
those of many of his clients. “We’re doing
a few more acres of split fungicide applica-
tions,” he said, adding that this is a precau-
tionary measure, done without evidence of
disease being present. “That shift has taken
place with the innovative guys—the pro-
ducers who aren’t worried about spending a
bit more to protect their crop.”
He’s keeping a closer eye on the
weather too, as historical rain patterns
change. “Moisture leading up to and
during flowering is cause for concern,”
he said. “And the one thing we all need
to get right is residue management and
seeding for strong emergence and even
crop development.”
“We’ve seen this disease move through
Manitoba so quickly there really wasn’t
anything anyone could do about it,” said
Harding. “But, because it’s moving more
slowly here, producers have the time to act
and react. They will do what they need to
in order to protect their grain.”
Fall
2015
grainswest.com
49
WASTED POTENTIAL:
Fusarium can
cause yield losses, grain downgrading and
market rejection of infected grain.
Photo: Canadian Grain Commission
