The day started with a distance ed lecture from Dr. Cliff Sadof, Purdue University Department of Entomology, on “Insect pests of tropical flowers: developing a clean stock program”.  Dr. Luis Cañas followed up with an insect diagnostics lab, including general insect characteristics (Orders), web tools and key characteristics needed for remote identification.   After lunch, we headed off in the big van to Green Circle Growers in Oberlin, OH.  Green Circle Growers is one of the largest producers of orchids in the US, shipping throughout the US and to other countries as well.  The company also produces a variety of other ornamentals as well as vegetable seedlings. Renato Zardo led us on a tour of the 100 acre facility and described its pest and disease management efforts, as well as plant growing practices, including robots to place plants in tidy rows!

Since 2008, Dr. Luis Cañas and Dr. Sally Miller have taught a two week short course (OSU Diagnostics Short Course 2014) each September entitled “Pest and Disease Diagnostics for International Trade and Food Security: An International Short Course”.  The course is held on The Ohio State University, Ohio Agricultural Research and Development Center (OARDC) campus in Wooster, Ohio.  This year it is being held from September 1 – 12.  The goal of the course is to provide up-to-date training on methods, tools and strategies to diagnose diseases and identify pests of important crop plants. All major groups of plant pathogens and insect pests are covered, as are classical diagnostics and identification, serology, PCR and isothermal DNA amplification, digital diagnostics and internet resources.  Field trips to the Ohio Department of Agriculture and local plant producers emphasize regulatory diagnostic issues.  The 2014 program is shown here: 1a Program 2014 OSU Diagnostics Short Course.

Day 1 – Introduction and virus diagnostics lecture and lab.  Dr. Cañas introduced the concept of digital diagnostics and provided tips and resources to produce high quality images for insect pest identification and disease diagnosis.   Dr. Redinbaugh provided a very interesting presentation on her work to identify the cause of a severe disease of maize – Maize Lethal Necrosis – in Kenya.  She used that experience to describe the tools available – from symptoms to RT PCR to sequencing techniques – to diagnose plant diseases caused by viruses.  In the lab, participants set up a serological assay (Tissue Blot Immunoassay) to diagnose several virus diseases of maize.  Dr. Fulya Baysal-Gurel and Dr. Miller then worked with the group to diagnose Squash mosaic virus in winter squash leaves using an immunostrip assay.