The 2007-2008 winter, and the early portions of the spring season, has brought substantial moisture into many parts of the state.

With further rain forecasted throughout the state over the next few days and weeks, it is important to understand how early season soybean development may be compromised by several plant pathogenic fungi that cause seed rot, seedling mortality, and root and stem decay. Frequently seedling health is ignored because plant populations are acceptable and stem and leaves do not express symptoms during early vegetative growth. Phytophthora sojae, Pythium sp., and Rhizoctonia solani are believed to be most important seedling pathogens, but others, such as Phomopsis and Fusarium sp. are actively invading plants from growth stages VE to V4 (Table 1). Infection may cause chronic symptoms, or remain latent and cause symptoms of plant decline during the reproductive growth stages.

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SOURCE: Nancy Koval, Paul Esker, and Craig Grau, Department of Plant Pathology, UW-Madison

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