Tuesday 13 May 2014

Get well soon!

Fungal Disease

Leaf Blast is a disease caused by a certain type of fungi. They can affect the rice plants at any growth stage. Lesions occur in the leaf, lesions refer to discolored areas for blast they are usually large spindle shaped with a gray center.

Lesion caused by Rice Blast.

Blast occurs in different parts of the plant, I remember the experts Dr. Sparks and Dr. Castilla mentioned neck blast and collar blast. They also visited our field and it was confirmed that we have leaf blast. They also advised to watch out for neck blast since it may affect the panicle formation of the plant.

Boron Toxicity
We are not sure if the picture below shows boron toxicity. Upon reading some materials symptoms include appearance of yellow discoloration of leaves that spread along the margins. Brown spots also appear on the leaves.  We only saw a few leaves with this condition and we assumed that it might be the effect of the newly applied fertilizer.
Not sure if this leaf exhibits boron toxicity.


Insect Pest- Stem borer

Stem borers are insects that feed on any stage of the rice crop. Drying of the central tiller during the vegetative stage is known as dead heart while stem borer damage druring the  flowering stage result into whiteheads. Whiteheads are either unfilled panicles or empty panicles.

Yes, our field was infested by stem borers. Here's the proof. :)

Oh hello! Mr. Stem borer!

Not sure if these are stem borer eggs. We found a few leaves with tiny eggs inside.
Weeds

Echinochloa colona a type of weed was present on our field.



Even if all of these are present on our field, we will not fret.  I know we can handle this! We will just go with the flow. Applying more chemicals may aggravate the current situation so better leave it as it is. We know our crops are strong just like the people who planted them. Should  I cue the dramatic tune now? :)



Wednesday 7 May 2014

Harvest time for Palay All Stars!

Harvest time!

At the start of the season

Field on harvest day


What a moment of pride and satisfaction!

















We used the Kubota mini combine harvester. We started with SL8, the hopefully high yielding hybrid with a mixture of jasmin and japonica characteristics.



 SL8 panicles

Halfway through the field and the grain storage of the kubota had to be emptied..




Next came the 238 variety. This lot had to suffer submergence in the beginning of the season, but  after transplanting  plants from denser areas to the gaps, the plants recovered amazingly well.




All sacks are weighed at the Experiment Station.


Now we have to wait for it to be dried to 14% moisture content, before we can mill it and start cooking it!

 


Thanks to the Palay All Stars Team, Experiment Station, Training Center, expert sessions!