The above photo is a shot of northern corn leaf rust.Leaf rust is a fungal pathogen and the cool moist year we are encountering is conducive to leaf rust development.Leaf rust should be monitored because if it continues to develop we could lose valuable photosynthetic leaf tissue reducing carbohydrate production which could lead to cannabilization of the stalk reserves to complete grain fill.This could lead to the ugly rearing of saprophytic anthracnose stalk rot and deterioration of stalk qualities and subsequent standability issues.Much of this depends on just how cool and wet the month of August and September will be.
The above photo is a shot of Corn Eye Spot.This is another fungal leaf disease that can deteriorate valuable photosynthetic tissue.Again if eye spot continues to develop with wet cool weather the halo of rings shown here will grow menacingly larger and coalesce to cause the leaf to show large areas of dead tissue.
The possible development of this all hinges on how moist and cool the weather of August and September remains.Eyepot again can lessen the plants ability to produce sufficient carbohydrate for grain fill leading the plant to want to cannabilize its stalks for maximizing grain yield.The plants focus is on producing fully developed kernels and it will try to do so at all cost.