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1-800 Number Kicks Off Eleventh Season - April 2004
April 21, 2004
UNIVERSITY PARK, PA --. This growing season Christmas tree growers, agricultural crop producers, turfgrass managers, fruit growers and homeowners from across the state will be dialing up the Pennsylvania IPM Program's 1-800 PENN IPM toll-free hotline to find out the latest pest and pest management information.
Callers to the hotline can receive information such as recent pheromone trap capture counts for their region, up-to-date disease development information, as well as tips on pest management tactics from the Pennsylvania IPM Program.
IPM, or integrated pest management, aims to manage pests -- such as insects, diseases, weeds and animals -- by combining physical, biological and chemical tactics that are safe, profitable and environmentally compatible.
Information on such crops as Christmas trees, sweet corn, potatoes, apples, tomatoes, ornamental plants as well as information about fly control and animal IPM are included on the hotline. Information on scheduled pesticide applicator training sessions is also included.
Messages on the hotline are updated frequently during the growing season -- sometimes as often as daily during critical management periods -- and are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Pest management specialists from the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture, Penn State's Departments of Entomology and Plant Pathology, and county offices of Penn State Cooperative Extension contribute their time and expertise to keep the information current and useful.
The system also includes a "fax-on-demand" function. When available, the caller simply requests a fax and indicates his or her fax number. The system then will send a fax containing in-depth information about the crop, graphs of insect activity over time and other data. The same toll-free number can be used to find periodic updates of the winter schedule of pesticide applicator training meetings.
The Pennsylvania IPM program is a collaboration between the Pennsylvania State University and the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture aimed at promoting integrated pest management in both agricultural and nonagricultural situations. For more information, contact the program at (814) 865-2839, or Web site http://paipm.cas.psu.edu.