Vegetable and berry growers seminar set

GREENSBURG, Pa. — The Western Pennsylvania Vegetable and Berry Growers seminar will be held Nov. 17 at the Days Inn, Butler, Pa.

The meeting features local and regional experts speaking about vegetable and berry growing and marketing. It also includes a trade show consisting of major regional suppliers, seed companies and others.

There will be morning and afternoon sessions on vegetable production along with a concurrent morning session on berry production and a concurrent marketing session in the afternoon.

Two pesticide license category 03 credits are available in both of the morning sessions and there will be two core credits and two category 03 credits in the afternoon vegetable production session.

Featured crops

Sweet corn and specialty crops are the featured crops this year.

Dwight Lingenfelter of Penn State’s Department of Crops and Soils has done extensive work on weed control in sweet corn. Lingenfelter will share his knowledge and discuss the most cost effective sweet corn weed control programs.

Debra Deis of Seedway Inc. and Mike Orzolek, Penn State professor and vegetable specialist will discuss “New and Specialty Cole Crops” and “Rare and Unusual Vegetable Crops to Spice up Your Market” respectively.

Beth Gugino, Penn State professor and vegetable pathologist will review the serious disease problems encountered this year and give her recommendations for next year.

In the morning berry growing session, Kathy Demchak, Penn State Extension associate for Small Fruit, will talk about starting right with a new blueberry planting and also blueberry variety recommendations. She will also update growers on new pest management tools.

Mike Ellis, Ohio State professor and plant pathologist for fruit crops, will cover leafspots, fruit rots and other strawberry diseases and also important bramble disease problems.

In the afternoon vegetable session, Celeste Welty, professor and vegetable crops entomologist from Ohio State will cover management of important insect pests of sweet corn.

In the concurrent marketing session a panel of growers and buyers will discuss how farmers can take advantage of the strong consumer movement for buying locally produced food products.

Registration fee

Registration fee is $30 if received by Nov. 11. Walk-in registration will be $35. That includes lunch, breaks and all handout materials.

Contact your local Penn State Cooperative Extension office or the Westmoreland County Office at 724-837-1402 for more information and a brochure with the program and registration form.

The brochure can be found at http://westmoreland.extension.psu.edu/ and http://washington.extension.psu.edu/.