Cranberry Station Newsletter 2024 Vol. 25:7

2025 UMass Cranberry Management Update Meeting

• Tuesday, January 28, 2025

• 7:30 AM - 4:00 PM

• Registration fee is $60 per person

   

• 4 pesticide credits are available

This will be a hybrid meeting; you can choose to join via Zoom or in-person. Meeting will be held in the AD Makepeace Meeting Room, at the UMass Cranberry Station. In-person seating may fill up fast due to room capacity allowance. Please return the meeting form as soon as possible to get your preferred attendance choice. Please contact Robyn Hardy at rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu (rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu) or 508-970-7635 for a payment form. 

TENTATIVE AGENDA

7:30 Check in starts, in-person coffee chat  

7:40 Zoom Info Starts – Marty Sylvia

7:50 Station Update – Peter Jeranyama

8:00 INSECTS – Marty Sylvia (credits)

Vaccinium scale, Cranberry Weevil, Black Bug, Toad Bug and Leaf Hopper, War on the Hemiptera

8:50 DISEASES – Leela Uppala and Salisu Sulley (credits)

Cranberry Fruit Rot Management, Phytophthora Root Rot

9:45 Coffee and Stretch Break

10:00 WEEDS Poison Ivy, Poverty Grass, Fireweed POLL – Katie Ghantous (credits)

11:00 Guest Speaker: Latest Genetic Research in Cranberry, Juan Zalapa, USDA, WI (credits)

11:45 New Cultivar Evaluation Update – Giverson Mupambi

12-1 Lunch Break on your own: Zoom takes a break, in-person may want to bring your lunch!

1:00 Grower Panel: New Plantings Tips – AD Makepeace, Oiva Hannula, and others

        Ag Innovation Grants – Brian Wick

1:30 Phosphorous and Nitrogen Fertilizer - Peter Jeranyama 

1:45 Growth Stages and Spring Frost Forecasting - Sandeep Bhatti 

2:00 USDA Update – Casey Kennedy, Dave Millar, Molly Welsh and Adrian Wiegman

        Cultivar Purity and Drone Knowledge – Dave Millar

        Water, Hydrology, Restoration Bogs – Casey Kennedy 

3:00 Drone Update from the industry- Ben Richards, Chris Motta, Matt Johnson, Dave Millar,  Ryan Wicks and Giverson Mupambi

Station News

by Peter Jeranyama, Interim Director

I would like to take this opportunity to thank cranberry growers, CCCGA and handlers for their help with the search for the new Director. Whether it be attending the presentations by the three candidates or joining a search committee member for a meal with a candidate, your participation and subsequent survey responses were helpful and informative to the search committee.  We are pleased to announce an offer has been extended to one of the candidates and it looks promising.

Many thanks to A.D. Makepeace and Cody Jones for assisting with our 2024 harvest. We rely on the generosity and kindness of growers throughout the year to accomplish many important tasks, including harvest. We are grateful for the great relationships we have with you. 

We successfully hosted Dr. Michael Fox, Dean of the College of Natural Sciences, and Dr. Javier Reyes, Chancellor of UMass Amherst, at the Cranberry Station on October 22nd.  They were accompanied by Senator Michael Rodrigues, co-chair of the UMass Cranberry Station Oversight Board. The afternoon began with an arranged visit by Brian Wick to an A.D. Makepeace bog where the Chancellor experienced cranberry harvesting for the first time. The Chancellor remarked that he was thrilled to actually participate in harvesting some cranberries! Thank you to CCCGA and A.D. Makepeace for coordinating this opportunity. The group then returned to the Cranberry Station to meet with faculty and staff, enjoy some refreshments, tour the facility and hear about cranberry research. Bags with our own fresh cranberries, sweet and dried cranberries from Decas-Fruit Dor, and Ocean Spray craisins and juice were given to the Dean, Chancellor and Senator to take home. 

THANK YOU ANNE AVERILL

After working at UMass for 36 years, entomologist, Anne Averill retired on October 31st.  We would like to thank Anne for her outstanding research and dedication to the cranberry industry and growers. We wish her a happy retirement.

2024 MASSACHUSETTS GROWING SEASON: A YEAR IN REVIEW

We are conducting a 2024 Massachusetts growing season survey to better address the needs of the industry. Your input is very important to us! Please take a moment to share your experiences this growing season.  2024 UMass Cranberry Station Survey

We appreciate your participation and thank you for your feedback.

News from the IPM/Weed Lab

by Katie Ghantous

GROWER USE OF PESTICIDE SPOT TREATMENTS

While cranberry pesticide application methods vary by region, nearly all Massachusetts cranberry growers make broadcast pesticide applications to cranberry beds by chemigation. When applying by chemigation, growers typically must treat entire beds and cannot easily target treatments to problematic areas. Spot treatments allow growers to make precise applications and deliver pesticides to problem areas rather than treating entire beds, allow growers to utilize some pesticides (such as glyphosate) that cannot be broadcast applied, and/or utilize other pesticides that cannot be chemigated (such as sethoxydim). Some of the drawbacks to spot applications are that they usually necessitate walking on the cranberry canopy, are time consuming/labor intensive to use, and can expose applicators to pesticides.

 In addition to obvious exposure risks such as those from spray drift while using a backpack sprayer, some recent work done at the Cranberry Station showed that even wick-wipers can expose applicators during use (dripping, splashing from treated weeds that snap upright after wiping, etc.). Applicators should be aware of these risks, and always use adequate personal protective equipment (PPE) when making spot treatments. 

The 2023 UMass Cranberry Management Update Meeting was held virtually on January 25 and 26 and attended by 172 and 161 people, respectively. The audience was 84.5% males, with 43% of the people over the age of 55, 41.6% ages 31-55, and 10.5% ages 18-30.

When growers were surveyed at the meeting about their use of pesticide spot treatments, the vast majority indicated that they do utilize spot treatments regularly. Nearly 65% of the 156 respondents reported they used pesticides as a spot treatment every year, while another 12 % reported using this method occasionally. 

Herbicides are the main class of pesticides used by cranberry growers for spot treatments. Postemergence herbicides are predominantly used followed by preemergence herbicides (Fig. 1). For all classes of pesticides, backpack sprayer was listed as the most common application method for spot treatments (Fig. 2). Wick-wiper and clipper/stump are only applicable for herbicides. 

Newsletter Signup Form

Please contact Robyn Hardy at rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu (rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu)  to receive the 2025 Cranberry Station Newsletter.

Meeting Payment Form

Please contact Robyn Hardy at rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu (rmhardy[at]umass[dot]edu) if you would like to attend the 2025 UMass Cranberry Management Update Meeting.