Nearly 200 hectares of spring rice in Con Cuong have yellow, dry leaf tips.

Spring crop 2018, Con Cuong district planted2,271.2 hectares of spring riceCurrently, nearly 200 hectares of spring rice in the districtYellowing and reddening of the base leaves appear, mainly on the varieties: Bac Huong, Bac Thom, VTNA6, Thien Uu 8...

The disease first appears at the tips of rice leaves, then spreads to both sides of the leaf edges and gradually spreads to the middle of the leaf; when exposed to sunlight, these diseased spots on the leaves wilt and turn the entire rice leaf white, causing the rice plant to lose its ability to photosynthesize, causing damage to productivity and severely diseased rice fields leading to crop failure.

People are actively visiting the fields to promptly detect and take measures to handle the situation. Photo: Ba Hau

According to Ms. Nguyen Thi Ngan - Head of the Con Cuong District Plant Cultivation and Plant Protection Station, the cause of this phenomenon is the influence of cold air in recent times, causing the temperature to drop sharply and suddenly, with a large difference between day and night.

This period coincides with the time when farmers apply fertilizer to the panicle, the amount of nitrogen in the plant is quite high, making the leaves green and young; plus the period when the rice changes from nutritional growth to reproductive growth, making it sensitive to external conditions. These synergistic reactions cause physiological phenomena to develop on a large scale.

Faced with that situation, the Con Cuong District Department of Agriculture recommends that farmers actively go to the fields to take care of them, maintain a moderate water level in the fields, and localities need to provide full information on the symptoms and nature of yellow leaves and dry leaf tips so that people do not confuse them with pests, leading to the abuse of pesticides during this period.