US (NY): Organic growers earn Excellence in IPM awards
Now, for his role as inventor, advisor, and developer of ecologically sound tactics for pests of organic farms, Lou Lego has received an Excellence in IPM award from the New York State Integrated Pest Management Program (NYS IPM) at Cornell University.
When Lego first began farming, he missed the challenge of engineering. He soon realized that he’d simply traded one kind of science for another equally intricate. “We’d hired high-school kids and I was nervous about using pesticides around them, so we went organic,” says Lego.
“To farm organically, you have to understand pest habitat, then build habitat for beneficial organisms, and that’s just for starters,” says Lego. “It gets complicated in a hurry.”
“I first worked with Lou in 1997, when he worked on a project that tested use of beneficial wasps to control European corn borers in sweet corn,” says Abby Seaman, a vegetable specialist with NYS IPM. These wasps are the size of this comma, harmless to his workers.
Lego soon became a regular collaborator and advisor on Cornell research projects, Seaman says. She notes that he also conducts his own research projects through U.S. Department of Agriculture funding — projects that often draw on his engineering expertise in novel ways.
“Of all the tactics Lou has pioneered, his spore-exclusion filtration system to protect hoop-house crops from devastating diseases is the one that continues to amaze me,” adds Seaman.
Lego is as passionate about sharing his research with other farmers as he is about the work itself. He hosts on-farm field days and speaks at farmer meetings in New York and beyond, says Brian Caldwell, research specialist with the Cornell Organic Cropping Systems Project. Lego served on the project’s advisory council and is a member of NYS IPM’s Grower Advisory Committee.
Caldwell put it this way: “Lou is an outstanding example of a farmer who thinks all the time about ways to make his farm more environmentally positive, tries them out, and shares his successes with other farmers and the research community.”
“It’s not every day you get to work with someone who’s so innovative and service-minded,” says Jennifer Grant, director, NYS IPM Program. “We owe Lou Lego a debt of gratitude for everything he’s done to advance IPM and New York’s farm community.”
Lego received his award on January 21 at the Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA_NY) Winter Conference in Saratoga Springs, New York.
“Pumpkin whisperer”
Meg McGrath, a Cornell University plant pathologist based at the Long Island Horticultural Research and Extension Center, is an internationally recognized researcher, sought-after speaker, and well-versed in the solutions to devastating plant diseases.
And for growers with trouble on their hands, she’s available at a moment’s notice.
These qualities and more have earned McGrath an Excellence in IPM award from Cornell University’s New York State Integrated Pest Management Program (NYS IPM).
“Pumpkin whisperer” checks in with her 1,872-pound patient.
McGrath’s expertise spans the gamut of IPM strategies and tactics that both organic and conventional growers use to combat disease pests such as late blight and downy mildew. “Meg embraced the concepts of integrated pest management from the beginning of her career,” says colleague Margery Daughtrey. “She does a splendid job of bringing her discoveries to the practical level for growers in dozens of presentations annually.”
But it’s her help in the field that farmers value the most — help that’s delivered with a welcome dose of levity. “Meg’s funny,” says Marilee Foster at Foster’s Farm in Sagponack. “She’ll say ‘I’m sorry, I’m a plant pathologist. I like to study sick plants.’” When a nearby outbreak of late blight threatened Foster’s organic heirloom tomatoes, Meg came to help scout — “arriving early so we’d have the visual benefit of dew,” Foster says.
When they found a handful of plants with symptoms, McGrath reviewed Foster’s alternatives, but none were suited for organic crops. The strategy they hit on together? Using a handheld weed-flamer to take down suspect plants. “Blight can’t handle temperatures much above eighty degrees,” Meg told Foster. “And it might feel good!” Which, Foster agrees, it did.
Meg focuses on core IPM principles — principles such as careful identification so you don’t treat a disease the wrong way, or changing a crop’s environment to outsmart its pathogens. “She helps Long Island growers deal with the limited availability of products they can use to manage pests, given the island’s heightened groundwater concerns,” says Jennifer Grant, director, NYS IPM. “It’s not every day you find someone who brings such warmth and knowledge to a position that means so much to so many farmers’ livelihood.”
Marilee Foster echoes that. “I have long admired the energy and curiosity Meg brings to farmers in eastern Long Island. We are lucky to have her working with us, for everyone.”
McGrath received her award on January 18 at the 2017 Empire State Producers Expo in Syracuse, New York. Learn more about integrated pest management at nysipm.cornell.edu.