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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Femke van den BergORCiD
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
© 2026 The Author(s). Plant Pathology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of British Society for Plant Pathology.Fungicides are used to control Septoria tritici blotch in winter wheat (Triticum aestivum) in England. In this paper we analysed data from a long-running survey of commercial winter wheat fields and explore how the use of foliar-applied fungicides has changed over the period 1985–2019. One of the aims of the analysis was to determine to what extent growers followed guidance on fungicide treatment and fungicide resistance management. Guidance suggests restricting fungicide treatments to key growth stages (GS, Zadoks growth stage). In the UK, these are commonly referred to as the T0, T1, T2 and T3 timings, which correspond approximately to GS30, GS31–33, GS39 and GS59–65, respectively. For Septoria tritici blotch the T1 and T2 timings are the key timings. Our results show that most growers adhered to this treatment timing guidance. The T1 and T2 timings were the most frequently used and had the highest efficacy. Current resistance management guidance suggests using alternation or mixtures of modes of action (MoAs) rather than using a single MoA sequentially. The data show that the number of MoAs used per farm and per crop increased from two around 1990 to three from 2010. The data showed that the number of mixtures used has increased considerably and there are few treatments nowadays not consisting of a fungicide mixture. The concept of ‘treatment according to need’ where the grower is guided to use fungicides as needed to maintain effective disease control, but not more, is followed to some extent by growers.
Author(s): Helps J, van den Bosch F, Sims I, van den Berg F, Paveley N, Whitworth L, Blake J, Smith J
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Plant Pathology
Year: 2026
Volume: 75
Issue: 3
Print publication date: 17/05/2026
Online publication date: 17/05/2026
Acceptance date: 10/11/2025
Date deposited: 01/06/2026
ISSN (print): 0032-0862
ISSN (electronic): 1365-3059
Publisher: John Wiley and Sons Inc
URL: https://doi.org/10.1111/ppa.70158
DOI: 10.1111/ppa.70158
Data Access Statement: The disease data are available on https:// www. pesta nddis eases urvey. co. uk/ , detailed data on crop management are available on reasonable request.
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