Location: Application Technology Research
Project Number: 5082-21000-001-099-R
Project Type: Reimbursable Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Jan 1, 2024
End Date: Dec 31, 2025
Objective:
Objective 1. Compare efficacy of anaerobic soil disinfestation (ASD) and soil steaming for suppressing soilborne diseases of high tunnel tomatoes
Objective 2. To determine soil microbial community recovery after steaming or ASD and impacts on plant and soil health
Objective 3. Facilitate discussions with farmers to determine barriers, opportunities and incentives to adoption of sustainable soilborne disease management practices
Objective 4. Disseminate best practices for ASD and steaming to farmers
Approach:
Cooperator and ARS researchers will:
Use a combination of on-farm and on-station trials to assess the efficacy of anaerobic soil disinfestation and soil steaming for managing soilborne diseases in organic high tunnels.
Determine the impacts of these practices on soil microbial communities using high throughput sequencing approaches and how this impacts their recovery and subsequent impacts on plant and soil health.
Cooperator researchers will also evaluate the acceptability of these practices to growers through interviews and questionnaires and disseminate information on the techniques through traditional Extension approaches.
ARS will support field trials and studies on impacts on soil health and microbiomes.
