Grant Information
| Knowledge Area | Subject of Investigation | Field of Science | Percent |
|---|---|---|---|
| 123 - Management and Sustainability of Forest Resources | 613 - Mixed conifer-broadleaf forests | 1160 - Pathology | 25% |
| 212 - Pathogens and Nematodes Affecting Plants | 2410 - Cross-commodity research--multiple crops | 1160 - Pathology | 20% |
| 216 - Integrated Pest Management Systems | 2410 - Cross-commodity research--multiple crops | 1160 - Pathology | 20% |
| 204 - Plant Product Quality and Utility (Preharvest) | 2410 - Cross-commodity research--multiple crops | 1160 - Pathology | 15% |
| 205 - Plant Management Systems | 2410 - Cross-commodity research--multiple crops | 1130 - Entomology and acarology | 10% |
| 211 - Insects, Mites, and Other Arthropods Affecting Plants | 2410 - Cross-commodity research--multiple crops | 1160 - Pathology | 10% |
States in the Northeast Region of the National Plant Diagnostic Network host about six percent of the nation's farms on less than three percent of the country's total farm acreage. However, with increased interest in various crops as sources of biofuels, some marginal lands are being returned to cultivation and the region's contribution to the nation's economy in this area is increasing. Furthermore, states in the region are also home to some of the most active ports in the U.S., including those in Wilmington, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Newark, New York, and Boston. Millions of tons of foreign agricultural goods and hundreds of thousands of people enter the U.S. through those ports each year. Unfortunately, history has taught us that not all transcontinental movement of plants and animals is beneficial or benign. In fact, some can have dramatic and historic consequences. Recent introductions of boxwood blight, the spotted wing drosophila, the emerald ash borer, Sirex woodwasp, soybean aphid, and soybean rust coupled with historic catastrophes resulting from introductions of gypsy moths, Dutch elm disease, and chestnut blight are vivid testimony to the destructive power of plant pests and diseases carelessly transported across natural boundaries to new ecosystems. Recent intelligence reports suggest that there is good reason to think that sooner or later the nation's agricultural infrastructure will become a target for terrorist attack, perhaps via introduction of economically debilitating plant pests or pathogens. And one or more major ports is likely to be the route of entry. In 2003, the U.S.Congress directed the USDA-CSREES (now, USDA-NIFA) to create national plant and animal health diagnostic networks to facilitate the rapid identification of unusual plant pests and pathogens and to ensure seamless communication of new discoveries to other diagnostic facilities and to regulatory authorities throughout the U.S. The National Plant Diagnostic Network (NPDN), now completing its 10th year of training and support to surveillance crews and preparing for the eleventh, was an outgrowth of that mandate. The NPDN is comprised of five regions, each with a hub at a major land grant university to coordinate training and data entry from diagnostic facilities throughout the respective region.
The overall goal of the NPDN is to safeguard U.S. agricultural crops and natural plant resources against introduced and endemic pathogens and pests. The Northeast region of NPDN, comprised of representatives of Land Grant Universities and Agricultural Experiment Stations from twelve northeastern states, forms a cohesive team of specialists who are skilled at rapid and accurate identification of noxious plant pests and pathogens. With the current proposal, we intend to use funds to
In addition, in 2012-13, the Northeast Regional Hub continues to represent NPDN in a collaborative effort with the American Public Gardens Association (APGA) and the University of Florida to expand a Sentinel Plan Network. This endeavor provides resource materials for arboretum and public garden staff employed by APGA members to be better "first detectors" in their own right and to have the tools necessary to train their colleagues and the public at large to be more vigilant with regard to plant pest/pathogen occurrences. Five SPN-specific regional workshops, two new training modules, and introduction of new training technologies (e.g. QR codes for optical scanners at sites within gardens), are planned as part of the NPDN contribution to this effort.
Within the region, regional hub staff will perform the functions listed below, followed by measures of success: 1. Providing state partners with protocols for entering data to the National Repository; success measured via reduced numbers of rejected data. 2. Providing or advising on purchase of equipment for contemporary diagnostic work; success measured as regional labs are prepared deal with day-to-day crises and provide surge capacity as needed. 3. Developing and dispersing resources for First Detector training and "teaching the teachers" how to use them; success measured as quality and quantity of training aids produced and and used by intended audiences. 4. Scheduling training opportunities for regional staff with APHIS or elsewhere as opportunities arise; success measured by number of attendees successfully transported, housed, and trained for four workshops. 5. Representing the NE region nationally where regional interests are at stake; success measured by attendance and interaction at one national meeting.6. Preparing, testing, and distributing standard operating procedures to enable advanced diagnostic tests for significant pests and pathogens; success measured by progress on development and adoption of new and existing SOPs. At the national level, NE regional staff contribute to the Network by ensuring that the regional hub laboratory and staff are prepared to either provide surge capacity to other regions or a have made proper arrangements to obtain surge capacity in the event that the NE region is overwhelmed with unexpected samples. 6. Collaborating with staff at the Southern Plant Diagnostic Network (SPDN) and the American Public Gardens Association to develop educational programs re. pest/pathogen/weed diagnoses and proper reporting of observations in support of the Sentinel Plant Network - a collaborative effort between the APGA and NPDN with NEPDN taking the lead on behalf of the NPDN. Partner states are expected to assist in fulfilling the mission of the Network by retaining the services of a competent diagnostician who is not wholly supported by NEPDN funds and who will conduct plant pest diagnoses as needed and submit relevant data to the National Repository. Each diagnostician will also conduct training for first detectors as opportunities arise.
Target Audience
The target audience are primarily master gardeners, extension educators, growers, State and Federal regulators, members of the American Public Garden Association.
Changes / Problems
Nothing Reported
Training & Professional Development
NEPDN members have attended NPDN and USDA-APHIS-PPQ-Science & Technology, Beltsville Laboratory sponsored training sessions of significant pathogens. NEPDN members attended 98 professional development workshops during this period. Topics included Bioinformatics, P. ramorum and P. kernoviae, Plum Pox Virus, Citrus Pathogens to include Citrus Leprosis & Citrus Black Spot and Phytoplasma using Apple Proliferation. Two members from the NEPDN attended two advanced training workshops this year. Tricia Allen (Cornell University) attended the Bioinformatics workshop and Ramesh Pokharel of the Maryland Department of Agriculture attended the Phytoplasma workshop. Some additional professional development workshops included many of our diagnosticians attending NPDN STAR-D trainings; the American Phytopathological Society national and division meetings; diagnostic workshops on morphological identification of pathogens; green industry conferences on fruits, vegetables, ornamentals, turf, nursery and landscape plants and weed identification; biosecurity training; arborists conferences; Laurel Wilt training; invasive species workshops; spotted wing drosophila identification; extension and grower meetings; Golf Course Superintendents Association Annual Meeting; National Plant Board and Cooperative Agriculture Pest Survey (CAPS) meetings; IPM meetings; and extension service meetings. There continues to be an interest in webinars and on-line trainings because of the reduced travel funding and our members being very flexible in the way they present or receive professional development information recognizing the continued importance of this activity. The topics covered a diverse variety of topics including the NPDN National Repository national access training; NPDN Confidence Levels; NPDN Governance Document; NEIPM webinar; and numerous topics given weekly during the 8-week, GPDN seminar series and many more. The Sentinel Plant Network (SPN), the collaborative endeavor with the NPDN and the American Public Gardens Association (APGA) continues to prosper. To date there are over 200 member gardens in SPN with representation in 45 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, three Canadian provinces, Costa Rica and Mexico. Member gardens commit to scouting their collections for significant threats and communicating with their state's diagnostician if they find suspect signs or symptoms. Last fall SPN conducted two professional development workshops for public garden professionals in the eastern US in Washington, DC and for central gardens in Madison, WI. This spring SPN conducted the first of three spring/summer workshops in New Orleans, LA. These workshops collectively served over 155 attendees. NPDN-SPN staff at Cornell continue to develop new scripted presentations on topics from APHIS's Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) Prioritized Pest List. In the fall presentations were released on Mediterranean pine shoot beetle (Tomicus destruens), rosy moth (Lymantria mathura), and tremex wood wasp (Tremex fusicornis) and this spring on Japanese wax scale (Ceroplastes japonicas) and mountain oak longhorned beetle (Massicus raddei). With the close of the FY15 project, materials will be completed on Japanese oak wilt and the oak ambrosia beetle (Raffaelea quercivora and Platypus quercivorus) and all of SPN's outreach materials that were produced at Cornell University previously will be released in Spanish. During this reporting period project personnel at Cornell University and Purdue University re-launched the public facing website at www.sentinelplantnetwork.org making all SPN resources produced by NPDN publicly available. In July of 2010, the NEPDN took a leadership role in the development of the STAR-D program and made significant progress with supplemental funding from the Farm Bill and USDA-APHIS-PPQ Science & Technology. On July 22, 2015, the NPDN STAR-D Board Members held a face to face meeting. A STAR-D Phase 2-Internal Auditor Training Workshop was performed during this period at the Oregon Department of Agriculture Plant Health Laboratory on September 22 & 23, 2015. The workshop goals consisted of three objectives, 1) to provide an opportunity for NPDN diagnosticians and technicians to learn more about the STAR-D system and gain valuable internal auditing skills by simulating the role of an auditor at a site that is preparing for an accreditation audit, 2) to provide the host laboratory a gap audit and documentation in the form of an audit report that provides details and recommendations for each section of their STAR-D quality system, and 3) to provide our STAR-D External Auditors in training an opportunity to hone their auditing skills in a practice environment which is a requirement in system, all External Auditors must experience two "practice" audits prior to their addition to our Auditor Pool. The workshop participants consisted of Clarissa Balbalian (Mississippi University), Rachel Bomberger Sprott (Nevada Dept. of Ag.), Ricky Corder (University of Arkansas), Sharon Dobesh (Kansas State University), Jennifer Falacy (Washington State Dept. of Ag.), Natalie Goldberg (New Mexico State University), Sandra Jensen (Cornell University), Yonghao Li (The Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station), Debbie Meyer (California Department of Food & Agriculture), Maryna Serdani (Oregon State University), Shouhua Wang (Nevada Dept. of Ag.), and Edward Zaworski (Iowa State University).The instructors for the workshop were Dawn Dailey O'Brien and Karen Snover-Clift (Cornell University) and Kathy Burch (USDA-APHIS-PPQ-Science & Technology [S&T]). On December 8 & 9, 2015 the STAR-D staff held the third Phase 2-Internal Auditor Training and Gap Audit at the Iowa State University. The participants included Tricia Allen (Cornell University), Sohrab Bodaghi (University of California-Riverside). Nathan Chambers (Washington State Department of Agriculture), Eva Grimme (Montana State University), Patricia Hosak (University of Missouri), Chelsea Jones (USDA-APHIS), Irene Lavagi (University of California-Riverside), David McCann (Ohio Department of Agriculture), Jesse Ostrander (North Dakota State University), and Barry Pryor (University of Arizona). On February 23 & 24, 2016, the STAR-D staff held the fourth Phase 2-Internal Auditor Training and Gap Audit at the University of Puerto Rico, Plant Diagnostic Clinic in Juana DÃaz, Puerto Rico. The workshop was hosted by the Director and Quality Manager (and a Professor for Plant Pathology for the University of Puerto Rico), Consuelo Estevez De Jensen. The participants included Tom Creswell (Purdue University), Kevin Korus (University of Nebraska-Lincoln), Sheila McBride (Texas A&M University), Nancy Osterbauer (Oregon Department of Agriculture), Karen Rane (University of Maryland), Gail Ruhl (Purdue University), Raj [Raghuwinder] Singh (Louisiana State University, Agricultural Center), Cheryl Smith (University of New Hampshire), Virginia Tarango (Oregon Department of Agriculture), and Meg Williamson (Clemson University). Four auditors completed their training at the Puerto Rico workshop, Raj Singh, Cheryl Smith, Nancy Osterbauer and Virginia Tarango) and one used this workshop as her first practice session (Sheila McBride). On February 16-18, 2016, an accreditation audit was conducted at the Texas A&M University, Texas Plant Disease Diagnostic Laboratory (TPDDL), College Station, TX. The Laboratory Director, Kevin Ong and the Laboratory Diagnostician, Sheila McBride, hosted an external auditor team made up of Shouhua Wang, Judy O'Mara and Sharon Dobesh. On March 08, 2016, Karen Snover-Clift and Dawn Dailey O'Brien held a workshop titled "The STAR-D Document Round-Up". It was a pre-conference workshop held at the NPDN 4th National Meeting in Washington, DC and 55 participants attended.
Dissemination Streams
NEPDN members have presented and published material focusing on general plant pathology; diagnosing plant problems; master gardener diagnostics and hot topics; the NPDN, NEPDN, SPN and STAR-D; specific pest and plant disease issues such as Seiridium canker, boxwood blight, emerging diseases of conifers; cucurbit downy mildew, basil and impatiens downy mildews, powdery mildews, garlic bloat nematode, Sudden Oak Death, pear trellis rust, winter moth, borers, mites, general pest problems, diseases of fruit, vegetables, turfgrass, and conifers; tree diseases, invasive species; as well as general pathogen information such as bacterial, fungal, viral and nematode pathogens; and abiotic issues such as cultural practices, effects of drought conditions on trees and shrubs, climate change; and the select and significant agents specifically targeted by USDA-APHIS; and pest emergencies such as Asian longhorned beetle, brown marmorated stink bug, spotted winged drosphilia and emerald ash borer in 517 presentations/publications attended by 19,676 participants. Attendees included individuals from grower organizations, arborists, agricultural inspectors, IPM specialists, golf course managers, crop consultants, master gardeners, first detectors, horticultural society members, pesticide applicators and other plant pathologists and entomologists. Please note, presentations listed here include interviews with radio and television stations and electronic factsheets where the numbers of individuals impacted are hard to estimate, therefore, small percentages of attendees were used and if total subscribers were given, the numbers were counted only once in a repetitive publication/presentation series.
Next Reporting Steps
Nothing Reported