Farmers Take No Chances With Rust

WAITSBURG - After struggling to control rust in their wheat fields last spring, Touchet Valley farmers aren't taking any chances this year.

Most, if not all, wheat growers in Prescott, Waitsburg and Dayton are mixing a fungicide like TILT or QUILT in with the herbicide they normally spray mostly through ground applications.

"I don't know of anyone who isn't," said Matt Weber, a certified crop advisor with the McGregor Company in Waitsburg. "After the horror stories last year, they're not taking any chances."

Last year, farmers in the Touchet Valley lost an average 10 to 15 percent of their wheat crop to stripe, while some lost half of their more vulnerable hard red spring wheat variety.

"It was widespread," Weber said, referring to weather conditions late last spring that conspired to promote the growth of rust. "Wet, 70-degree temperatures and winds spread the spores around."

Prescott wheat farmer and Walla Walla County Commissioner Perry Dozier was one of the farmers who lost half his yield in one of his fields.

"We had enough damage to easily pay for the spraying," he said, saying he could have avoided the problem by spraying preventatively earlier in the year.

Waitsburg grower Jack McCaw agreed.

"Last year, many of us were on the fence, but this year everybody has decided to just do it," he said.

Some rust spores have already been detected north of Waitsburg and in the Walla Walla Valley. And it doesn't help that March has been a wet month.

With two more days to go in the month at the time of this newspaper's deadline, 3.01 inches of rain had already been measured at the Dayton weather monitoring station, which is nearly 50 percent above average, according to the National Weather Service in Pendleton.

This March ranked as the 19th highest for monthly precipitation in Dayton since 1893, the first year records were kept.

The relatively high price of wheat - $8.55 per bushel as of Friday - makes it an easier decision for most farmers this year, Weber said. The fungicide costs about $5 per acre.

"There hasn't been a major outbreak yet," he said, explaining that the month's temperatures aren't conducive to the spread of rust. "But I'd say 90 percent of the farmers here are using fungicide as a preventative application."

Even with that, the farmers may not be completely out of the woods.

The applications are effective to knock down the spores for about a month, so if the fields don't dry and warm, wet conditions persist instead, they may be looking at more spraying, Weber said.

"It's hard to predict," he said.