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Barley Brown Rust
Puccinia hordei
General Description
Brown rust in barley can cause extensive brown lesions on the leaves. This will lead to a loss in green leaf area and a severe attack will have a big impact on yield.
Look out for random dark brown pustules on the leaves. Symptoms can occur at an time, but they are most common in the autumn and in the early summer at head emergence. Barley brown rust is distinct from wheat brown rust and the rusts are host specific.
Biology
Crops will survive through the green bridge effect where the rust spreads via wind dispersal from the mature crop onto later tillers, barley volunteers before infecting winter sown barley.
Spring sown barley will be infected by winter barley. brown rust is usualy considered to to cause most damage at warm temperatures, but it can survive over a wide temperature range.
Mild winters will increase the chances of survival, but it will cause most damage during warm weather in the summer (15-25C).