The July All In For Citrus podcast episode focuses on the Citrus & Specialty Crop Expo. The event is scheduled for Aug. 20–21 at the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa.

Micheal Rogers, director of the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) Citrus Research and Education Center, previews a new, special educational session on alternative crops. Rogers said the session will focus on bamboo, macadamia, avocado and mango production.

The bulk of alternative crop presentations will focus on bamboo, which has been gaining more attention in recent years. Rogers said there are more than 1,000 acres of the crop planted in Florida, and some processing infrastructure is falling into place. Bamboo has food, wood and other use functions and is in high demand. He said the goal of the bamboo presentations is to set realistic expectations about the cost of establishing the crop, growing it and its market potential.

Tripti Vashisth, UF/IFAS associate professor of citrus horticulture, joins the podcast to provide details on the citrus seminars, which include 21 presentations on HLB management and other current topics. She said the primary focus of the presentations will be to provide information that growers can use in their groves right now.

Jamie Burrow, UF/IFAS Extension program manager, talks about the UF/IFAS citrus research booth that will be on the trade show floor. The booth is one of the largest exhibits and is always a highlight for attendees.

Burrow said several key research scientists will be available throughout the event at the booth so growers can have one-on-one interactions with the experts. Attendees can also pick up educational materials in the booth like the new edition of the Florida Citrus Production Guide. And there’s plenty of swag like pens, notepads and other freebies for the taking in the booth.

Don’t miss the latest All In For Citrus episode. And don’t miss the Citrus & Specialty Crop Expo; register here!

In the June All In For Citrus podcast, Michael Rogers gives an update on some of the activities keeping University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) researchers busy this summer. Rogers is the director of the UF/IFAS Citrus Research and Education Center in Lake Alfred.

One of their big projects is helping to coordinate the citrus seminars for the upcoming Citrus & Specialty Crop Expo on Aug. 20–21 at the Florida State Fairgrounds in Tampa.

Rogers provides a sneak peek of the citrus presentations, which number more than 20. While the Expo program will focus on HLB management, additional topics will be addressed. This includes other diseases and pests, crop insurance considerations and more.

The citrus seminars will provide growers with the latest knowledge on how to optimize trunk injection of oxytetracycline (OTC). New research on OTC applications and degradation and how different varieties respond to treatments will be shared. There will also be a presentation on advancements in automated trunk injection.

Lukasz Stelinski, UF/IFAS professor of entomology and nematology, joins the podcast to give growers useful reminders on Asian citrus psyllid (ACP) management. He stresses the importance of new flush in timing insecticide applications targeting the ACP. Stelinski also emphasizes the importance of dormant sprays during the winter to really push the pest’s population down.

On the disease front, Megan Dewdney, UF/IFAS associate professor of plant pathology, speaks in the podcast about some key disease concerns this time of year, including phytophthora brown rot, algal spot and canker. She adds that melanose could be more problematic than normal due to recent weather patterns of heavier rainfall.

The May All In For Citrus podcast features highlights from a recent OJ Break hosted by the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences (UF/IFAS) Citrus Research and Education Center (CREC) in Lake Alfred.

Podcast host Frank Giles caught up with Michael Rogers, CREC director, during the event. Rogers summarized some of the information presented at the OJ Break, including a talk by Nian Wang, UF/IFAS professor and Graves Eminent Scholar Endowed Chair in Biotechnology, on his work to develop a CRISPR citrus tree with resistance to HLB.

Wang has already engaged with the regulatory agencies required to get a CRISPR tree approved for commercial use by growers. Those agencies include the U.S. Department of Agriculture and Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services. Rogers said the good news is a CRISPR tree is not a transgenic genetically modified plant, which means the regulatory process is easier to navigate. When a tree is proven to work in real-world grove conditions, it can be moved to growers more quickly. But Rogers added it will take time to identify the right tree.

In addition, Wang discussed an observation he made during his research on letting some rootstock shoots grow up into the canopy of the tree. Some rootstocks have proven to be more tolerant to HLB.

“Studies have shown that the root-die off from HLB is caused by carbohydrate starvation, because the plant is not moving the carbohydrates down to roots from the leaves,” Rogers explained.

Wang observed that the rootstock shoots act as a means to move carbohydrates down to the roots. This could help sustain roots in HLB-infected trees.

“I want to be clear this an observation and not a recommendation from UF/FAS,” Rogers said. “But it might spark some ideas with growers as it did today with the OJ Break audience. And that’s a fact that some of our rootstocks are very tolerant to HLB on their own.”

Also discussed in the May episode of All In For Citrus is managing the growing problem with snails in citrus as well as survey results on grower attitudes toward trunk injection of oxytetracycline. The podcast is a partnership between UF/IFAS and AgNet Media.