2018 ASHS Annual Conference

Plant disease management is an integral part of ornamental plant production. Nurseries and greenhouse operations typically take certain actions to limit disease incidence and spread, but they may be unsure which practices would be the most effective or have the lowest cost to implement. A system-based approach considers the whole operation to identify situations or practices that are most likely to spread plant diseases. There are printed assessments that growers could use to better understand practices that increase or decrease their risk of cultivating plant diseases at their operation. These written tools can be cumbersome, require specialized knowledge to complete, and are not linked to additional educational resources. To address these challenges, we developed a new online decision-support tool which prioritizes the most important disease hazards, so users can determine where to invest limited resources to have the greatest impact. The online tool also allows the user to select only those practices that are relevant to them (i.e. greenhouse production but not field production). The user receives immediate feedback to identify disease hazards associated with their current practices, and suggestions for corrective actions. Links to additional resources are provided. This decision-support tool should decrease disease losses and increase profitability over time, for growers who are willing to make the necessary changes in their production practices.