Produce growers can tap into webinars from Cornell, Penn State

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Vegetable and small-fruit growers can participate in a series of monthly, Web-based seminars that will kick off Dec. 18.

Presented by Penn State Extension’s Vegetable and Small Fruit Program Team in collaboration with Cornell Cooperative Extension, the monthly webinars will be offered from 1-2 p.m. on Wednesdays, with time for questions and answers.

Any size farms

Aimed at those involved in commercial production of vegetables and small fruits on any scale, the webinars will provide updates in vegetable and small-fruit production for extension educators, producers and industry representatives in Pennsylvania, New York and surrounding states.

The sessions will feature presentations by faculty members and extension educators in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences and Cornell’s College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.

Registration gives you access to the live webinar, but also to handouts and recordings. So even if you miss the live webinar, you can catch it on the recording.

Planned webinar topics and presenters include the following:

• Dec. 18, Sweet Onions: Cultural Practices and Brand Marketing; Christy Hoepting, extension vegetable specialist, Cornell, and Lee Stivers, horticulture extension educator, Penn State.
• Jan. 15, Spotted Winged Drosophila and Brown Marmorated Stink Bug; Kathy Demchak, senior extension associate in plant science, and Shelby Fleischer, professor of entomology, Penn State, and Greg Loeb, professor of entomology, Cornell.
• Feb. 12, Dealing with Late Blight; Meg McGrath, associate professor of plant pathology and plant-microbe biology, Cornell, and Beth Gugino, assistant professor of plant pathology, Penn State.
• March 19, Conventional and Organic Weed Control in Sweet Corn, Pumpkins and Winter Squash; Robin Bellinder, professor of horticulture, Cornell, and Dwight Lingenfelter, program development specialist in plant science, Penn State.
• April 2, Fertigation: Scheduling and Water Quality Considerations; Elsa Sanchez, associate professor of horticultural systems management, Penn State, and Steve Reiners, associate professor of horticulture, Cornell.

The cost for the webinars is $10 per session or $35 for the entire series of five.

Register for the webinars online at http://extension.psu.edu/vegetable-fruit/winter-webinars or by phone at 724-627-3745.

For more information, contact Lee Stivers at 724-228-6881 or by email at ljs32@psu.edu.