The forecast: Sunny with a chance of fungus. Such a forecast would be welcome news to farmers when used with conventional weather reports, as fruit, vegetable and crop growers in the Northeast try to get a jump on crop pests that could decimate their stock.

"We're right in the middle of apple scab season," said Curt Petzoldt, Ph.D., Cornell senior extension associate in the Integrated Pest Managment (IPM) Program at Cornell University's Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, N.Y. "Soon, we'll start to worry about onions, tomatoes, potatoes and grapes, but for now we're watching the apples." Whether it's fungus, bacteria, insects or other farming pests that agriculturists are worried about, they now have a new resource: Cornell IPM specialists and growers throughout the Northeast now provide growers daily, proprietary pest forecasts, as part of the Northeast Weather Association (NEWA).

"Right now, we have the vegetable and fruit growers using the system; there's a lot of economic value to using it," Petzoldt said. "Hopefully, sometime down the road, we can add growers of ornamentals, perhaps golf courses and dairy farmers. They would find a lot of value in the pest forecasts."

Here is how it works: NEWA is a consortium of growers who have installed small weather stations on their land. Each day, information such as the temperature, relative humidity, leaf wetness and precipitation is transmitted from the farm to the Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva. There, the raw data is processed by several computer programs, each designed to evaluate the data and issue a pest forecast specific to the area where the fruit or vegetable grows. A grower can either choose to find the daily information from a personal computer or opt to have a forecast sent via facsimile.

For example, a New York onion farmer may want to know when onion maggots likely will appear so that the grower could take prevenative measures. With onion seedlings already beginning to emerge, the farmer can check the forecasts and know when the first-generation adult fly populations emerge and reach their peak. This enables the farmer to take effective steps to reduce onion maggot damage. Good control of first-generation onion maggots is helpful in reducing damage done by the second and third generations, which take flight in mid to late summer.

"This kind of information is valuable to growers because they need to know when all the flies have emerged," said Jan Van Der Heide, Cornell Cooperative Extension educator in vegetable production, Oswego County, N.Y.

Growing grapes in upstate New York? Heed the forecast for chances of powdery mildew or phomopisis or black rot or any of the other problems that could plague grape plots. Or you may need to know the leaf wetness period.

"For those growers -- vegetables, grapes or whatever -- subscribing to the association and heeding its information may save a few sprayings a year; that could cover the cost of membership," Petzoldt said.

So far, in its first year, more than 50 growers have joined the association. John Gibbons, NEWA's project coordinator, maintains the weather stations in the farmers' fields and orchards, ensuring the information flows back to the computer in Geneva. Cheryl TenEyck, NEWA's systems analyst, looks after the various pest forecasting computer programs. Tim Weigle, IPM coordinator for grapes in western New York, is working to bring all of the region's grape growers to the system. Petzoldt, IPM coordinator for vegetables, works to advise the vegetable growers about this system.

Currently, most of the NEWA members are in New York and Pennsylvania, but the association is looking to add members in the entire Northeast region.

"The cost of technology was prohibitive, but now with lower-cost computer chips, better, lower-cost weather instruments, we can do this. Right now NEWA is the only place a farmer can get this kind of specific pest forecast information -- all with a click of a mouse," Petzoldt said.

For information on subscribing to the NEWA forecasts, contact Curt Petzoldt at (315) 787-2206.