The USDA’s Agricultural Research Service is working on multiple research projects to better understand tar spot, a growing problem in U.S. corn.
Steve Goodwin, ARS researcher in West Lafayette, Indiana says they’re screening corn varieties and germplasm lines for their susceptibility or resistance to tar spot, “We started to see some lines look almost immune and others look very highly susceptible which is not what I was expecting to see. And that implies a more major gene for resistance.”
Goodwin tells Brownfield they’ve been working two years toward understanding the tar spot fungus which has spread from the Great Lakes Region to Iowa, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Ontario, Canada.
