Due to consistent, and in many cases, excess rain across the province, a Manitoba Agriculture plant pathologist says risk for fusarium headblight is higher this year.

However, Pratisara Bajracharya notes the risk changes everyday, which is why the province releases a daily fusarium risk map. She says producers need to consider crop staging when deciding whether or not to spray for fusarium head blight.

"Spraying for fusarium head blight will be only be effective if it were to be sprayed at the start of flowering, and if the risks were considerably high in that area," Bajracharya says, "so you'd have to consider rainfall amounts in the past seven days and also look at forecast map."

Bajracharya says crop disease issues overall are more widespread this year, but remain at mostly low incidences.