Stressgard Seminar

In 2015, Envu held a series of educational seminars in Sydney, Canberra, Melbourne and Brisbane for Turf Managers and Golf Superintendents. Called the StressGard^® Seminar Series, they were well attended, despite some terrible weather conditions.

Keynote speakers included: Dr. Richard Rees, Ph.D, Mbiol Cbiol, R&D Fellow, Product Development Manager, Envu Environmental Science, USA. Richard Rees is responsible for coordinating all herbicide, fungicide and plant health technical development activities both synthetic and biological.

Dr. Rees presented two talks: “StressGard Technology and Measuring and Assessing Plant Health”. Jyri Kaapro, Envu’s R&D Manager undertook a presentation on “Tempo^® Xtra – Envu New Insect Management Product ”. Peter McMaugh, from Turfgrass Scientific Services, attended the Sydney seminar, and kindly offered his feedback:

“Dr Richard Rees is an outstanding communicator with scintillating command of the science behind the StressGard^® technology. I was fascinated by the application to shaded turf. The slides he showed comparing leaky outer wall cell membranes in untreated plants and intact membranes in treated plants were quite intriguing to say the least. This is an area of physiology and plant anatomy that I have been fascinated with for over 40 years.

Peter added “I look forward to pursuing Dr. Rees’ conclusions much further. If this new tool lives up to its promise, it has an extraordinary future indeed as an adjunct to genetic improvements in this difficult area.”

Dr. Percy Wong, Ph.D, BScAgr (Hons), Senior Research Fellow at the University of Sydney, was also a keynote speaker at the Sydney and Canberra seminars. Dr. Wong is currently researching fungal causes of numerous emerging patch and root diseases in sports and amenity turf and developing management strategies for their control. Dr. Wong presented a talk on “Trends in disease occurrence in the Australian market”.

Dr. Rees was joined by Dr. Sheldon Navie for the Brisbane seminar, held at the Golf Driving Range, Brisbane airport. Dr. Navie is a highly trained botanist and has a significant amount of scientific knowledge, particularly in the fields of plant ecology, weed biology and plant taxonomy and identification. He is also a consulting scientist with the IVM Group. Dr. Navie presented a talk on “New weed occurrence in the Southeast Queensland market ”.

Peter Kirby, Turf Market Manager for Envu Environmental Science in Australia & East Asian Pacific, said “We were very pleased with the interest and attendance at the 2015 StressGardSeminar Series. As a market leader, and innovative R&D company committed to sustainable development, we want to share our global knowledge and expertise with our customers, and vice versa, learn from them. The StressGardtechnology has a great fit for the Australian turf market. StressGardtechnology is an advanced turf specific formulation, refined over 15 years, that essentially acts like a sunscreen on turf in hot conditions, reducing the impact of harmful ultra-violet radiation and selectively allows for the transmission of red and blue light wavelengths used by turf plants for photosynthesis. By filtering the sunlight and allowing only the spectrum of light that the turf requires for photosynthesis, radiation and heat stresses on the plant can be significantly minimized.”

As a result of this reduction in stress, StressGard formulation technology has been proven by US universities to provide the following plant benefits:

• 2 – 3 times increase in drought tolerance.
• Improved root function/nutrient uptake.
• Increased root mass.
• Increased tiller density.
• Increased chlorophyll production.
• Improved control of stress diseases.
• Enhanced turf physiology processes.

StressGard Formulation Technology is in both Signature^™ Stressgard^® and Interface^® Stressgard^® fungicides.

To find out more information, reach out to our team.  

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