EVALUATION OF AN EMPIRICAL QUALITATIVE MODEL FOR THE CONTROL OF STRAWBERRY POWDERY MILDEW AT SOUTH-WESTERN SPAIN

The efficiency of a Decision Support System (DSS) for strawberry powdery mildew control were tested during three seasons on an experimental farm in Huelva (South-western Spain). Two different DSS schedules were compared with the standard Integrated Production management. When fungicide application decisions were made following the empirical model, a reduction of 20% on the total fungicide application was achieved during three crop seasons, and, furthermore, the reduction of chemical fungicides applied raised to 41.6%, when compared to standard Integrated Production management. The higher disease incidence was observed on strawberry plants grown on biosolarized soil.