The 2014 NYS Field Crops Weekly Pest Report and Evaluation

Abstract

he NYS Field Crop Weekly Pest Report provides timely pest information to field crop extension educators and agricultural professionals. The report compiles weekly pest and crop observations collected by field crop extension personnel across NYS. In addition, the weekly report provides a vehicle to disseminate other relevant IPM information such as pest identification, scouting techniques and a calendar with suggestions for pest management activities. The pest report is distributed as a Cornell Cooperative Extension Blog. Subscribers (110) to this blog include: Extension Educators, crop consultants, growers, agribusiness, and Cornell University Faculty. We also place the blog link on the NYS IPM facebook page (160 followers) and NYS IPM Field Crops Twitter account (250 followers). Twenty-three issues of the NYS Weekly Pest Report were published in 2014. Extension Educators and crop consultants utilize the Weekly Report as an overview of timely pest information, and have found the report useful in alerting their local clientele regarding pest management issues. Results from an evaluation survey indicate users extended articles from the report to approximately 8000 individuals by republication in newsletters or forwarding the report on their own list server. Many crop consultants who responded indicated they used pest report information directly with growers.