0:00  
Jim: Hi everybody, and welcome to the Plantopia podcast, produced by the American Phytopathological Society. I'm Jim Bradeen. I'm Associate Vice President for Strategy at Colorado State University and the new host of Plantopia. And we're delighted that you're here for season two. Today, we have a very special guest and very excited to introduce Uta McKelvey, who is an extension plant pathologist and assistant research professor at Montana State University and somebody that I know pretty well from Twitter. Uta, thank you so much for being here.

0:44  
Uta: Hi, Jim. It's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for inviting me.

0:47  
Jim: We really do appreciate you taking time to talk with us about your exciting work at Montana State and your career path to plant pathology. So I guess to kick us off, I'm really curious about who you are and how you ended up in this amazing field called plant pathology?

1:06  
Uta: That's a great question. Well, I guess you have the framework of it, my name, my position, title. And you know, sometimes I wonder myself, how I ended up in plant pathology. The truth is, I didn't pursue it until my PhD degree or PhD studies. And I kind of stumbled across that field of research. By accident, or maybe accident is not the right word. It's like just, you know, happenstance that just like the right combination of things that led me in that direction, but um, you probably heard it, I have an accent. I'm not originally from the United States or Montana. I'm actually originally from Germany. And that's where I did my undergrad and graduate master's degree. And there I was studying plant physiology. And I was working on barley mostly. And after that, I kind of felt like I wanted to go other places and explore different disciplines. And I, you know, had an eye out for a Montana State University and met Mary Burroughs, at that university, who probably many of you and you for sure didn't know her. And so she was gracious enough to offer me a position as a grad student. And so that's how I ended up on a plant pathology field of research. So, I mean, so I was interested in plant pathology, even during my undergrad graduate studies, but at the University where I studied, which is the Martin, Martin Luther, when he visited in Hello, Wittenberg, that's like East Germany, they didn't have a specific program for Plant Pathology. So I just didn't have that exposure. But I was always curious about the interaction of, you know, between plants and the environment and other organisms. So it makes sense to explore it further.

2:51  
Jim: Yeah, that's really fascinating. I think so many of us have those origin stories in the field of plant pathology, it really is a discovery science. For many of us. It sounds though, at a very early age, as though you had a passion for plants, and were plants fit in the environment, can you talk a little bit about that?

3:13  
Maybe it's not as romantic or, you know, intense as you think. But, you know, I really always liked biology and science, even in school. So I knew I wanted to pursue a degree in science. And I just found biology as an undergrad very appealing, because it just covers such a broad spectrum of fields of study. You know, one thing that always guided me when, in a way making decisions, what to study, like to meet, people always played a big role. So meeting a professor, or another researcher, who talks and presentations that really talked about, you know, an interesting subject, or just had an interesting personality attracted me to those areas of research, which, you know, tells you something about the importance of speech, how you represent signs and, you know, engage with the public about science, right? But so, a lot of these personal interactions guided me in the direction and that's certainly true for Mary burrows, who became my advisor. But, um, I mean, generally, I recognize that plans are the foundation of society and how how we live today, you know, So agriculture is the foundation of society. So I knew, once I figured out I want to work in plant physiology, I always had this ambition to work in agricultural relevant crop, you know, research that is related to agriculture, which I think eventually led me into my extension, a position right now.

4:41  
Jim: That's really wonderful and very fascinating, and I would call it romantic actually. So wonderful origin story, and we're glad that you you did find plant pathology. You mentioned your PhD work. When was this and what was your PhD all about?

5:01  
Uta: So, um, I started my PhD at Montana State in 2016. And I graduated in 2020, during the first year of the pandemic, but you know, I feel like I'm one of the fortunate ones where, you know, the whole lockdown situation actually worked out and that I was forced to just lock myself in an office and right. So, I know there are a lot of people who weren't that lucky. And so my research was on a disease complex that is caused by several viruses, it's called restrict mosaic virus, it's or restrict mosaic disease. And it's a very widespread and serious disease of wheat and many other cereal crops, in Montana, in the United States, but really worldwide. And so my focus was on that disease complex and understanding how agricultural practices in Montana contribute to disease risk. And you know, as a conclusion from that, what we can change in terms of management practices to mitigate disease risk.

6:05  
Jim: And you're still working with this disease, if I'm not mistaken. Is that true?

6:11  
Uta: So right now, not very actively. I mean, I work in a scatter diagnostic lab, which is the diagnostic lab at Montana State University. And so I do get my hands on a few weed streak samples each year, more or less, you know, as they're submitted by our clients for diagnosis. And, you know, I suspect that if there was an epidemic of weeds drug epidemic occurring in the future, that I would get more involved. But right now, I don't have like active funding on it. And, you know, the irony is that as soon as I started working on this disease that kind of vanished in Montana, we had a really big epidemic in 2016. And then we got funding from USDA NIFA, to do my research project on that, and the disease more or less disappeared. So you're welcome, Montana,

7:04  
Jim: [laughter] You're the lucky charms. Congratulations on that.

7:09  
Uta: I'll just stick around to protect the wheat crop here.

7:13  
Jim: Great. Can you give us a context, though? It sounds as though this disease is somewhat intermittent, at least in Montana. Is that is that true everywhere? In what's sort of driving that dynamic?

7:27  
Yeah, I think it's true that it's intermittent in Montana, I guess I call it sporadic. It comes in waves. It really occurs all across the Great Plains in the United States. So you know, our wheat growing regions across the United States, that's where you have wheat and other cereal crops, that's where you have with strict mosaic. And I would say that in the central Great Plains, like Nebraska, Kansas, and Texas, and you know, all the states in between, it's a more consistent problem than it is in Montana. But let's say the amplitude, like how severe it is, in a given year, will still vary. And so there's a whole lot that goes into that. But so one major driver for this disease, or maybe I should back up because we need to know some like basic facts before we can talk about why it fluctuates. So I mentioned that weed streak is a viral disease. And there is at least three viruses that we know of right now that cause this disease, which is why we call it I call it a complex. So the most the virus that we probably know the best is weed streak mosaic virus. And funny enough, it has its centennial this year, it was discovered exactly 100 years ago, in Nebraska if I'm not mistaken. And there are two other viruses. One is called the High Plains wheat msaic virus and 
Triticum mosaic virus. And they together form this complex and what they have in common is that for one, they all attack wheat as their host. Also other small grain crops, barley, for example, durum obviously, and corn as well, and I'm blanking on the other ones. And so they're all also transmitted by the same vector, which is the weak chromite. It's a very small area of fire, it might that you can't see with your bare eyes. But if you had a hand lens or a microscope, you would see it it's point two millimeters long. It's kind of like a tiny white sausage. And so that wingless might carries the virus when it is winter spurs between plants or fields. And so under like when we're trying to understand this viral disease complex, we really need to think about the vector because that's what spreading the virus in the environment, and so does might needs the needs with plans for protection because they're not very well equipped to withstand heat and and drought. So they need the plan to protect them from desiccation. So it needs to go from a living host to living host. And so factors that provide more suitable hosts in the environment are essentially factors that drive which request. And so one important host that occurs between two wheat crops is what we call pre-harvest volunteer wheat. So it's wheat that is accidentally sown into the field, which often happens when we have hail storms that hit wheat fields that are near maturity, They shatter grain onto the ground, and often with hail storms comes moisture. And so in the presence of this moisture, that shatter grain germinates and produces that pre harvest volunteer wheat. And so the mites can move from the harvest the maturing wheat crop that is drying down and doesn't provide that protection for the mites anymore into the volunteer wheat, which the where, which is where Termites can over summer, so to say until the next winter wheat crop is planted, and then they move into that winter wheat crop. So the presence and timely occurrence of volunteer wheat is really an important driver. And so the other thing is really long or warm, long falls that give plenty of time for mites to move into a newly planted winter wheat crop and establish there and have the virus established, there are another factor that really have an impact on the severity of a of infection. The earlier plants are infected with the virus, the more severe the symptoms and the impact on yield is. So this is me trying to summarize a very complex topic and hundreds of years of research and just you know, very short podcast format, but this is my try.

11:52  
Jim: It does sound like a very complicated system. Glad to know that you're you're working on it sounds like you've been very successful so far. And we hope that that continues. It sounds as though there are a lot of different hosts that are part of driving this disease complex. I noticed one of your recent research publications, which you published in 2021. In Plant Health Progress, by the way, which is an APS journal. So thank you for supporting our society. This paper focuses on on resistance to wheat streak mosaic virus in winter wheat, spring wheat and barley cultivars. Can you comment on the importance of host resistance? Is there first of all, is there much host resistance? And from a management perspective? Is that a good strategy?

12:47  
Uta: Yeah, that's a great question. And, you know, leads to a very important point. So that paper was published as a result of studies that I did during my PhD. So host resistance is one of the recommended and more effective management strategies for this disease. So because it's a viral disease, there, you know, we have to aim at preventing an infection in the first place, there is no cure for plants once they're infected with the virus, right. And unfortunately, to the vector, the Wiko mite is like very difficult, it's very difficult to manage with insecticides, because it lives in the secluded and elite in the world, leaf worlds of the host or in these, you know, very protected areas where, you know, usually or traditionally use contact, insecticides don't get too. So prevention is key. And one way to prevent infection or early infection with the weed streak viruses is using host resistance. So there are several genes that have been discovered, and that confer resistance to wheat streak mosaic virus and 
 Triticum mosaic virus, there is no resistance known to High Plains mosaic virus at this point. And another challenge is that those resistance genes have so far only been successfully deployed in winter wheat. It appears that when we deploy those genes in spring wheat that it has like very negative effects on yield. So the like the wheat cultivars may be, you know, resistant to this virus but may not be very, you know, competitive from a economic standpoint anymore. So part of the study, in that, you know, I wrote about in that publication was to screen breeding lines and cultivars that we that are popularly grown in Montana, to assess their resistance or tolerance to the viruses because there's not really information out there and you know, You probably know that every state has their own, you know, selection or variety of cultivars that they like to grow. And so, you know, what's true for Nebraska may not be true for Montana. And so we try to better characterize the varieties that were growing in Montana, so that we're able to recommend to growers in a high risk year, you may want to consider planting this variety over that, because it seems to be more resistant or tolerant. 

15:32  
Jim: Great, are there other control measures that are available?

15:35  
Uta: Yeah, so most of the control measures are cultural. And so the, I mentioned the role or the importance of volunteer lead, pre harvest volunteer wheat in the disease cycle. So the most important management strategy really is to control what we call the greenbridge, which is volunteer growth, and also grassy weeds, which also can host viruses and these viruses and the might, they need to be controlled before you plant your wheat crop. And so that's like the most important management strategy that, you know, we emphasize, and they need to be the plans, all these alternate hosts need to be well dad before you plant your new crop, so that you don't have a situation where a dying summer host, you know, causes all the mites to leaving the sinking ship, so to speak. And, uh, you know, finding your newly emerging winter wheat and then just settling in there. And so greenbridge management is important. The other thing that we recommend in higher risk years is delaying planting date, especially in years where it looks like we're going to have a long, warm fall. Growers want to consider planting later, rather than sooner to kind of extend that gap between green crops, which of course, you know, there are limitations to that, right. When we're growing. When we're planting in the fall, we also need the moisture and when there is rain, we want to plan to capture that moisture. So you know, on paper, those management recommendations often make a lot of sense and Sounds straightforward, but I well recognize that in reality for grower it's is still a difficult decision to make. So one thing actually that my project was about that, you know, we try to help out with this, you know, tricky situation making a decision was I, we develop so me and collaboration with a postdoc at a time, Tim Seipel, who's now an extension with specialists at Montana State University, Bob Peterson, who is an entomologist, David Weaver, who is also an entomologist at MSU. And Mary, we developed a tool that we called aware assessment of wheat streak mosaic risk, where we try to essentially develop a very simple risk model where growers can provide answers to predefined questions that are essentially getting at some of the risk factors which we identified are most contributing to disease risk. So the growers are being asked these questions and they're selecting the answer based on the scenario that they're looking at. And that model then spits out an assessment, you have a low medium or high risk of weed streak. And so we hope that by playing through these scenarios, on the one hand growers understand, you know, how certain factors contribute to risk for this disease, because it's, you know, it's a lot of information, it's difficult to understand if you're not, you know, an expert who's studied it for years. And the other thing is that, you know, this could be a tool that can actually like help predicting risk at this point, it's not because we just don't have enough quantitative data to really play through those scenarios. But we identified those risk factors and put them in a tool in a very, like, compact form, you know, that's hopefully capturing the attention span of a modern day smartphone tablet user.

19:14  
Jim: That's really beautiful. And your approach really speaks to the ethos and the importance of extension, thinking not only about the biology of the host of the pathogen in their interaction, but but also the the cultural economic context in which diseases exist, and what really drives decision making processes. So I see extension right there in your description of your work. And it's not a surprise then at this point, you are an extension plant pathologist. And and what's what's that, like?

19:56  
Uta: I mean, I think it's a lot of fun. I really really like it? So, I mentioned earlier that, you know, I was really interested in doing research on crops, you know, like some, some, something that is really like important to society and, you know, coming to Montana, which, after all, is still an agricultural state, it's the biggest sector of our industry. And, you know, it's easy to recognize the importance of agriculture, and also to recognize how important crops and the people who grow those crops are for, for us in Montana, but you know, really globally. And so I always liked that research that is very immediately applicable to, you know, the people it's intended for, I like research that, you know, has a very specific applied purpose. So I think, in a sense, that's extension spirit. And that's the type of research I really like to do. And so being now an extension plant pathologist, I just get a kick out of, you know, talking to people about my research, and then seeing how that is very relevant to them, and how that matters, and also listening to them and their problems. And then thinking of ways that I could design an experiment by to proposal, you know, all these things to find answers, try and help them, you know, be more, have a more productive, sustainable farm, essentially.

21:30  
Jim: So that's, that's really fascinating. Thanks for sharing that perspective on extension. I mentioned at the top of the program that we know each other, particularly through Twitter, and if you're not following us on Twitter, I think you should you can find her @UtaMcKelvy, you recently tweeted a picture of you and several other women with a caption that read "A female all-extension panel ready for today's show of Montana ag life." And that got me thinking about women in plant pathology. A lot of women have had incredible impacts in our discipline, and continue, of course, to have incredible impacts on our discipline. More specifically, though, your tweet got me thinking about what it is to be a woman working in extension. So could you comment a little bit on that and offer any advice you have for women or girls who would like to work in this field.

22:35  
Uta: I'm trying to be political right now politically correct right now, but

22:38  
Jim: We're all among friends.

22:41  
Uta: So I will say maybe as a woman in STEM or plant pathology, I've been surrounded by a lot of very strong female characters that have continuously encouraged me to pursue pursue this career. And it never occurred to me that being a woman could be some kind of barrier because of these people around me. And so I think, in that sense, I've been lucky or maybe even privileged to have had that community around me or have found that community, women an extension, I actually have to admit, I do not know the numbers, but I think we can, it's probably safe to bet that the agricultural field is still dominated by men, at least, you know, those who are farmers there, I would say the majority is still male. And so when you're a woman and extension, I would say that you have to work a little harder to gain that trust of those people. So extension is about building relationships with your stakeholders, and, you know, gaining their trust, because only if they think you have some, you know, you have credit, and if if you have their trust, they will start listening to you and trusting that what you say might actually be valid. And so I think as a woman, there might be a little bit of a look at you as an outsider, not like completely as an outsider, but you know, like, just, you know, you're just not, you're just not the farmer, farmer, Joe, you're a woman. And, you know, in addition to that, I do have an accent. So it's very obvious that I'm not bumping up bread. So it is a little bit of a barrier. But typically, you know, as soon as I give a talk, and I make them laugh a little bit, all those, you know, hesitations that I attend, that I often cents in the room are kind of gone. But I will say, you know, from my experience, often in Montana, I don't even know if it is because I'm a woman or you know, agricultural communities, rural communities are tight knit and so people that they they haven't seen before, you know, you're as you're a stranger, and they're gonna, like sniff you out a little bit before they're gonna invite you over for beer. But for me, honestly, it really just takes one presentation and a couple of jokes about my accent. And I'll be there at the, you know, the detail gate after party with a Bud Light in my hand. So I think I entered at a very opportune time and what may have been barriers in the past, I don't perceive as barriers or that big of barriers anymore.

25:16  
Jim: Yeah, thank you so much for talking very openly and honestly about your experiences. And I'm really delighted to hear that you've had strong and important mentors in your life, and that your stakeholders are so fully engaged with your, your, your leadership in this space. That's, that's really inspiring. One other aspect about extension that I've always appreciated, I should say that I have never held an extension appointment. But I've had the privilege of working with many colleagues who do work in extension. And I've always been in awe of their, I'll call them people skills or the soft skills. Do you have any suggestions for maybe graduate students out there that were thinking about careers in extension? How can they build those soft skills that are so important in extension?

26:14  
Uta: Yeah, that's a great question. I think what's really important and extension is that you're personable, and that you can deliver, that you can break down complex scientific contents to, into easily understandable terms, and, you know, translate them into the real world. So, you know, farmers don't care that much about you know, which statistical tests you use, and what the p value is, they want to know, the bottom line. So oftentimes, when I looked at my data, I essentially asked myself, like, what is the key information here for the grower? What is it that they care about at the end of the day, so like, really thinking about, you know, the big picture of your research and how, what your, how what you're doing in your research relates back into the big picture? And, you know, what's the bottom line is, you know, is a is a good skill to have, and then, you know, it's really about communication. So I would just say, take every opportunity you can to, to talk and talk about your signs and, and present and, you know, seek out diverse audiences, like, you know, we're used to presenting within our community within our department, or at APS meetings range, regional or national, but, you know, if you think that you, you could be successful, or you're could be interested in extension. Or even if you're not, you know, I encourage you to seek out an opportunity where you get to talk to growers, or maybe get go and talk to high school or middle school students or events like that, there is this awesome movement now call a Skype, Skype of scientists, right? Where you can be paired as a researcher with a classroom and then talk to children of different grades about your science and all these opportunity for you to like, practice those skills and see if you like it, you know, I personally find it really enriching to get that feedback from the audience like that was really helpful. I never understood this before and have them you know, you will be surprised how, like, curious and thirsty for knowledge growers are, you know, they ask the best questions, really, and there's always a awesome energy in the room. So I find it really invigorating and inspiring, really. So I say to all the grad students and students out there, give it a try and see what what happens.

28:45  
Jim: That is really, really great advice for anyone interested in extension, and really any of us, we should all strive to be able to communicate our science effectively and accurately without relying on jargon. It's something many of us do struggle with. And I appreciate your perspective and skill set that you've acquired. One last thing I really, very, very curious about want to know more about is your role in in plant diagnostic, and more broadly, your perspective on this field and its importance to plant health.

29:20  
Uta: Yeah, so I work as a plant diagnostician in the scatter diagnostic lab. It's the diagnostic lab at for Montana. And my specific responsibility is field crop samples. So if extension agents or growers that see something funny going on with their crops, they can bring it to the scatter lab or mail it and we'll have a look at it. And what specific or great about our lab is that we are fortunate to be able to offer our services free of charge to Montanans and so it's really a great resource. And honestly, I think that diagnostics is a lot of fun. It's um, it's kind of like detective work trying to like find the clues that you know give you the answer to what happened here what might be going on, I will say I have only one full season under my belt. So I haven't like seen by far, all the things that can go on. But I know for sure, it's a lot of fun and super interesting. And you learn something new every day. And certainly every season, if you're not very familiar with diagnostic labs, our lab is part of a nationwide network, which is called the National Plant Diagnostic Network. So essentially, every state has at least one plant diagnostic lab. And we recently just had a meeting two weeks ago, where we all met for the first time since 2019, in person, which was awesome. So providing a diagnostic service in a state is, I think, a really important thing, not just for agricultural producers, obviously, you know, early detection or identification of a disease or an insect issue or even an abiotic issue, you know, just knowing what's going on can save a grower an individual thousands and millions of dollars, right? Think about, I mean, I don't want to bring a weed suit right now, because you know, I'm biased that sense. But we know that there really destructive diseases out there. Let's take 
 Ascochyta blight of chickpea, for example, it's a fungal disease, it's a foliar disease, it has this explosive potential where a small area in a field with symptoms can spread across an entire field within weeks under favorable conditions. So knowing that you have that disease here, and knowing what you can do to manage it, in this case, fungicide applications are necessary in season can save your entire crop, right. So that's an important service for agricultural producers. But you know, on the flip side, if you see a spot on your crop, and you think it's the disease, you bring it into the lab, and we find out that it's extra physiological, that can save a lot of money to write because it doesn't, it's not necessary to apply a fungicide, which also costs a lot of money, especially these days, right. And so another important function, that diagnostic lab surface first detection, you know, of new diseases, pathogens, pests, that are, you know, have entered the state or even have entered the state, you know, we can detect them early enough and, you know, alert the instances or the people that are, you know, in that chain of communication to take measures to prevent the further spread. So, it's really an important function to individuals, the livelihood of individuals, but really the, the economic productivity of us of a state or even a region for that matter. So diagnosticians are, I think, are not as visible as they should be. And in certain ways, you know, under appreciate it. So go and say thank you to diagnostician if you have the chance. Yeah.

33:10  
Jim: You heard it here on the Plantopia podcast everyone, thank a diagnostician. We should make T shirts. I love the idea. That's what we'll start hashtags on Twitter, too. So I like that one. But it's really been amazing to chat with you, I appreciate you taking the time to share your perspectives on plant health, your career path, and this this great field that we call plant pathology. Any last things you want our our listeners to know?

33:44  
Jim: Yes, it's maybe going a little bit back. It's about what we talked earlier, you know, like lessons learned or advice to give to grad students. You know, as I was finishing up my degree, I was thinking a lot about the things that I learned and that, you know, I wish I had known in the beginning and these kinds of things. So I took the time to write some of them down and you know, at the risk of this, you know, turning kind of cheesy, I want to use this opportunity to kind of bring them out there for you know, I know, I know, you know, grad school is a heart thing. And sometimes you just need to hear that. People have gone through it, and you will do too. So if you don't mind, I would like to share some wisdoms from that. And so the context here is that as I was approaching graduation, I took a very long hike with a colleague of mine, just outside of Bozeman, which is where I live. We have what we call the Bridger mountains, and they have a rich line that you can hike and it's a hike of 19 miles at a very high elevation. And so we were doing that one summer and we had to get up real early in it. to hike really long. But as I was thinking about that hike, I was thinking how it was a lot like grad school. So here are the analogies between taking a really long hitch rich hike and grad school. It's a long and rocky road. And at first, it may seem insurmountable, an insurmountable challenge, but you can do it. And you know, as with every challenge, you will conquer it by putting one foot in front of the other. So don't think about the whole thing at once, just take it one step at a time, you got to find your own pace. And you shouldn't worry if others are faster or slower than you. And it's important to make friends along the way. Because this journey is long. And it can be hard. And it's best if you have a support system around you to to help you with that to fall back onto. And you know, really important every now and then you should really stop and make sure that you're still on the right track. So like have a road map and then check where you are in relation to that can be really important, especially if you're running out of daylight on the rich. And equally important it is it's to you know, take a break and look back and see how far you've already come and challenges that you've already mastered. And, you know, celebrate those little peaks that you've already mounted and passed. You know, it's not just about that big graduation. In the end, it's about the small steps and things you've learned in between. And finally, and maybe the biggest advice if you need to cut the rest. Take good care of yourself on the way. Brakes are important. You gotta refresh, you got to keep your strength. Gather your strength. So it's not a sprint, it's a marathon, or rich hike, as I was saying. So this is my wisdom in you know, just a few bullet points for everyone. Thanks for this opportunity.

36:54  
Jim: I love that. I know that something that pretty much every graduate student or former graduate student can really relate to so thank you so much for those perspectives. And thank you again for being with us on Plantopia podcast. 

37:11  
Jim: We just heard from Uta McKelvey extension plant pathologist and assistant research professor at Montana State University. You can find her on Twitter at Uta McKelvy. That's U-TA-M-C-K-E-L-V-y. I'm Jim Bradeen, the host of the Plantopia podcast. I appreciate you being here with us today, and we look forward to our next episode.