By Mariana Prieto-Torres, 2022-2025 FFAR Fellow
at North Carolina State University
Cucurbit crops include beloved fruits and vegetables such as cucumber, squash, watermelon, melon and pumpkins. These crops are exposed every year to the disease cucurbit downy mildew which reduces yield and quality of the fruit . Farmers currently manage downy mildew with weekly fungicide applications, which commonly start a few weeks after the seeds have been planted. These fungicide applications are more effective when they are applied preventatively at very early stages of the disease. My research as a PhD student and FFAR Fellow at North Carolina State University is about optimizing the use of fungicides to have the most effective disease management while reducing the number of fungicide applications