Spudchat is back after a longer than anticipated hiatus!

This week, we hear from Jonathan MacLennan of MacLennan Properties, West Cap and Brandon MacPhail of MacSull Farms, New London, to hear how their crops are looking so far this year, as well as hear about new projects underway on their farms.

If you have feedback about Spudchat, please feel free to contact us at [email protected].

In this episode of SpudChat, Ryan Barrett chats with Kelvin Montagu of Applied Horticultural Research in Australia about regenerative agriculture at the World Potato Congress, held in late June in Adelaide, Australia.  

This recording was done by the folks at PotatoLink, the Australian potato industry extension project.  You can find out more about PotatoLink at https://potatolink.com.au, and you can check out their podcast at https://www.buzzsprout.com/2022082.

In this episode, Ryan talks with Dr. Aitazaz Farooque, Professor of Precision Agriculture with the University of Prince Edward Island.  Aitazaz has been a frequent collaborator on research projects with the PEI potato industry, including research into the use of soil electroconductivity (EC) for creating management zones, uses those zones for variable rate fertility or seed spacing, investigating compaction, and now working on using AI and machine learning to identify PVY in the field.  We discuss all of these projects and more in this chat.

In this episode of Spudchat, we talk to Dr. Ian Scott of AAFC in London, Ontario about insecticide resistance in Colorado potato beetles.  Ian was part of a team that worked for the last five years to test potato beetles from across Canada for resistance to commonly used insecticides, uncovering some very interesting results.  We talk about those results and the next steps in managing these persistent pests.

In this episode, we talk to Dr. Tyler MacKenzie of Agricultural Certification Services in Fredericton, NB to talk about the work that their team is doing on PVY, including some research into aphicide resistance that they did for us here in PEI last year.  Tyler also talks about using new lab techniques to identify Verticillium and nematodes, which cause potato early dying.

In this episode of Spudchat, we head "across the pond" again to speak with Martyn Cox, an independent agronomist in England who has been working hard to figure out how to manage wireworm, which has become more of an issue in recent years.  Martyn has been collaborating with folks in PEI for the last few years to inform how they improve their IPM strategies back in the UK.  Martyn updates us on the challenges they face with wireworm and how they are making headway in reducing losses from this pest.

Spudchat is back!  Apologies for the hiatus, but looking forward to bringing you more potato chat this year.

In this episode, Ryan talks with Dr. Mark Stalham of Mark Stalham Potato Consultancy in the United Kingdom.  Mark worked for many years at Cambridge University Farm and then NIAB CUF before starting his own private agronomy consulting firm.  Mark has presented in PEI before and has a great knowledge of potatoes, especially irrigation, compaction, and soil health.  In this podcast, we dig into the state of potato research and agronomy in the UK as well as what some of the biggest challenges are for British growers and how they are working together to meet those challenges.

In this episode of SpudChat, Ryan talks with Dr. Mario Tenuta from the University of Manitoba about Potato Early Dying complex (PED).  Mario was the lead for Canadian Potato Early Dying Network (CanPEDNet) project as part of the FVGC National Cluster for the last five year, and included research happening here in PEI.  They talk about some of the key findings from the research project, as well as where we go from here in terms of managing the disease.

In this episode of SpudChat, we hear from Greg Donald, General Manager of the PEI Potato Board from a presentation Greg made at the 2023 PEI Potato Conference.  Greg provides an update on the ongoing potato wart investigation, the results of the International Panel report on potato wart in PEI, and how this informs the path forward toward resuming seed shipments from the Island to the rest of Canada and beyond.

This episode features another of our presenters from the 2023 PEI Potato Conference in Summerside on February 13th.  Today, we hear from Anne Verhallen of OMAFRA in Ridgetown, Ontario, talking about practical approaches to soil health.  Anne is a well-renowned expert on cover cropping and soil health improvement, working primarily with horticulture crop producers in South-Western Ontario.  Anne discusses some of the results of trials that indicate how producers can prioritize soil health in a number of ways, but also shares the perspectives of some of the producers she works with.