b"Another disease to watch for is leak, which causes the water to leak out of your spuds. Leak is a soil borne disease thats present in almost all agricultural soils, but a wound must be present on the tuber for it to get infected, Secor said. Leak doesn't occur in the field; it only occurs after harvest. And it only occurs in tuber pulp temperature above 20 degrees Celsius. So, one of your best friends to carry in the field at harvest time is a pulp thermometer, he explained. Adding that you should stop Your buyer customers wantsharvesting potatoes if the pulp temperature reaches 18 C.good seed and if you sellTo reduce risk of leak you can reduce damage at harvest and them good seed, theyll comedont harvest if the pulp temperature is too high, Secor said.back year after year after yearKeeping Seed Potatoes Disease Free thats important.Potato disease reduction isnt just about what you as a grower do, its also about the seed that you plant. For seed growers, they GARY SECOR need to watch out for some of the same storage diseases.Your buyer customers wants good seed and if you sell them good seed, theyll come back year after year after yearthats important, Secor said. He added that if you sell bad seed then youre going to get blamed every time something goes wrong in the field.Good seed is important to get a full stand establishment. When you have a poor stand it leads to things like pink eye, heat runners, and verticillium, Secor added.Best management practices should be followed whether you use cut seed or whether you dont cut seed, whether you use a seed treatment, or you dont use a seed treatment, he said.The seed you sell needs to be physiologically young to middle aged, disease free and meet certification requirements. The trucks and handling equipment need to be sanitized before the seed touches them, and the seed needs to be stored cold.If seed is pre-cut, store the seed under high humidity at 90 per cent or more, temperatures of 10 to 12 C and makes sure theres lots of air, Secor cautioned. He added that these are the same conditions you should store seed in if you are healing wounds. For cut seed you also want to make sure your storage piles arent too high. If the seed is too wet from harvest or a mancozeb-based seed treatment was used, then you should watch for bacterial seed decay.Seed treatments can help with management of Pectobacterium diseases as they manage Fusarium which can be an entry spot for the soft rot bacterium, Secor said. Liquid seed treatments should be applied at ultra-low volumes and then allowed to dry. Best management practices for soft rot are to keep your seed dry as they cant survive without water, dont plant in wet soils, and avoid seed with Fusarium dry rot.Seed treatments should be used for management of rhizoctonia, silver scurf, Fusarium, or late blight. These diseases are seed borne and seed treatments are part of an integrated management plan for management, Secor added.Options for non-seed treatments include using a bark seed dressing to manage the cutting juice, dry the seed, and favour wound healing. Secor explained bark seed dressings dont have a fungicide in them as theyre an organic matter which allows good flowing of the seed. 44SPUDSMART.COM Winter 2023"