wrench in the IPM program,” admits Johnson.
Teasdale is the Berry IPM
Coordinator for E.S. Cropconsult and has worked there since 2002, looking after blueberries, raspberries, strawberries and blackberries, as well as currants and gooseberries. She is now working on her master’s degree in pest management at Simon Fraser University, and hopes to have it finished in the spring. She has a BSc from the University of B.C. in sustainable agriculture. Johnson also holds that UBC degree and has been at E.S. Cropconsult since 2009 working in the same area: Berry IPM Consultant. Both are part of the eight-member full-time supervisory staff at E.S. Cropconsult and seasonally, there are about 20 part-time students as well. The company was begun in 1988 by Deborah Henderson, who is now director of the Institute for Sustainable Horticulture and holds the LEEF Regional Innovation Chair at Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Langley.
Along with the monitoring work, both Teasdale and Johnson also do some research, with Johnson working particularly with SWD, which she said showed a quite different behaviour this year, likely due to the wet, late spring and cool beginning to summer.
Numbers crept up slowly this year, she noted.
Teasdale is also involved in a fungicide spray trial for mummy berry and canker in blueberries and a trial for weevils in raspberries. On the horizon is a new pest which has already been detected on one farm in the Fraser Valley, cherry fruit worm in blueberries.
It lays its eggs in the berries and the larvae feed in berries as they
ripen. It’s another harvest contaminant, like SWD and it has been in the Okanagan for awhile. In general, it’s important to keep plants and soil healthy to combat pests, including proper pruning and nutrient management, advises Teasdale.
Regular monitoring is a vital part of an IPM program, along with an understanding of disease and insect pests, their different stages in life; where and when they’re vulnerable to predators; and where and when they attack which crops and cause damage.
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Canadian Farm Business Management Council
14 British Columbia Berry Grower • Winter 2011-12
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