Key points

• Dr Kevin Moore, who began his career with the NSW Department of Primary Industries 55 years ago, is retiring
• He is responsible for helping to save Australia's fledgling chickpea industry when Ascochyta blight hit in the late 1990s
• His research and collaboration with chickpea breeders have seen varieties releases with increased Ascochyta blight resistance, supporting industry expansion.

When Dr Kevin Moore started his plant pathology career in Sydney in the early 1970s, he often found himself heading into regional NSW.

Limited access to vehicles meant hopping on the Northern Mail train and being met by the district agronomist the following morning. “Back then a night at the local pub would be $2 and a middy of beer 10 cents,” he recalls.

Like the cost of travel and beer, many aspects of life have changed in the 55 years since Dr Moore started out as a trainee pathologist at the former Biological and Chemical Research Institute at Rydalmere.

What has remained unchanged, though, is Dr Moore’s commitment to Australian growers.

As he retires from his post as NSW Department of Primary Industries (DPI) senior plant pathologist, his passion for the industry has been highlighted by many who worked with him.

GRDC Senior Regional Manager – North, Gillian Meppem said the well-known researcher had been instrumental in improving grower and adviser knowledge of Ascochyta blight and how to manage it.

“Kevin’s commitment to the industry has been a game-changer in terms of improving the way some of chickpeas most problematic diseases are managed,” Ms Meppem said.

“A lot of his work has involved GRDC projects and like many in the grains industry we will miss his expertise and his dedication to genuine on-farm change.”

Paul McIntosh, Pulse Australia industry development agronomist for the northern region, recalls meeting Dr Moore when desi chickpeas were facing “dark days” – Ascochyta blight had surfaced in chickpeas.

“In the winter of 1998, Ascochyta blight hit us between the teeth,” Mr McIntosh says. “I met Kevin with the late John Slatter and Mike Lucy from the then Queensland DPI. We were standing in a paddock blackened by disease and felt it was all doom and gloom. But that was the moment Kevin rose to what he is now in chickpea folklore. He took the challenges on board and began a crusade to give the chickpea industry back to us.

“With John’s persistence and Kevin’s research and confidence, I believe the desi chickpea industry was saved.”

Mr McIntosh says Dr Moore’s passion was also shown in the kilometres he racked up visiting growers. “He’d turn up in central Queensland regularly during chickpea growing seasons, and not just the NSW areas. We’ve been very lucky to have a truly dedicated person like Kevin Moore in our pulse cropping industry.”

Tackling Ascochyta blight is an important legacy of Dr Moore’s work. Reflecting on his retirement, NSW DPI director-general Scott Hansen says Dr Moore’s applied research, knowledge, enthusiasm and dedication to plant pathology played a pivotal role in establishing and nurturing the pulse industry.

“His rapid development of integrated disease management strategies to assist chickpea growers to respond to the national outbreak of Ascochyta blight was critical to ensuring the industry’s continued viability,” he says.

Since that time, Dr Moore has worked closely with NSW DPI’s chickpea breeding team to develop more disease resistant varieties, further supporting the expansion of chickpea production.

“Dr Moore has also contributed to disease management strategies for significant pathogens, including Phytophthora, Botrytis and Sclerotinia in chickpeas. He has a strong focus on the extension of his research findings to growers, which has seen much of his work adopted by industry. His endeavours, including providing comprehensive plant disease diagnostic services and conducting disease diagnostic workshops, have increased awareness of these key diseases among growers.

“Growers and agronomists will benefit long into the future from the chickpea disease management packages developed.”

NSW DPI group director of plant systems Dr Alison Bowman says that, importantly, Dr Moore knew how to get his message across.

“‘Kevo’ always gives very clear, practical advice. If he told you to spray a crop three times, you did it. He is a great scientist but also a very practical one, working alongside the industry. And he’s still out and about jumping fences.”

In a career that has seen international travel, Dr Moore says it is the growers, agronomists and their families who stand out as career highlights. “They have always welcomed me and kept me passionate. Along the way I got to know their families and their dogs. And I still get Christmas cards from them.”

Dr Kevin Moore says there is still much to do to ensure the industry keeps abreast of challenging pathogens and potentially changing fungicide rules. Photo: Nicole Baxter

He says his relationships with GRDC, its program managers and panel members have been equally important. “Without their understanding and the funding, we would not have got the work done.”

Early beginnings

Dr Moore says his passion for agricultural science was spurred by his uncle, a dairy microbiologist. “We’d visit him every year for a holiday, and he introduced me to the microscopic world in his laboratory. I think I was about 10 at the time and my passion started there.”

Growing up on a two-and-a-half-hectare soldier settlement farm in Sydney’s south-west, Dr Moore was selected to attend Hurlstone Agricultural High School. After graduating in 1965, he was awarded a scholarship by the then NSW Department of Agriculture to study agricultural science at Sydney University. Lectures in physiology and botany piqued his interest and he majored in plant pathology and mycology.

As a Department of Agriculture trainee, he was soon working at Rydalmere as a plant pathologist. This included being the department’s duty pathologist every few months, something that made for well-rounded, general pathologists, he says.

“Every 12 weeks we would be assigned this job for the week. We could be sent in a wheat or a pineapple plant.”

Back then, once a specimen had been investigated and a decision made, the pathologists would write a response and drop it into the typing pool. “On your way to work the next day, you’d pick the letter up, check it, sign it and then put it in the post tray. That could take up to a week, so if it was urgent we could call the district agronomist’s landline and get the message through. For diseases that needed in-crop management, a week could be a long time.”

While at Rydalmere, Dr Moore also completed a master’s degree at Sydney University on Phytophthora, and then a PhD at Washington State University.

When he and his young family returned to Australia in 1978, he was meant to head to Wagga Wagga. However, staff reshuffling saw him become acting director of biology – a role he held for only a short time. Stripe rust had been discovered in wheat and he moved to Tamworth. “There was no plant pathologist there, so my last act as acting director was to assign myself that role.”

That was 1980 and Dr Moore has been in Tamworth since.

Future

Dr Moore says there is still much to do to ensure the industry keeps abreast of challenging pathogens and potentially changing fungicide rules.

“Managing Ascochyta blight with the foliar fungicides chlorothalonil and mancozeb is vital, but it we follow Europe and lose these, we will be left with products that are four times the price and can only be applied twice a season.

“I think we would then see a decrease in production. That is why the breeding program is important.”

As an example, he says that PBA Seamer (PBR), introduced in 2016, has been found with Ascochyta blight. “Last year, only four years after it was released, we found crops at Forbes that had Ascochyta blight and there are numerous reports that this is occurring again this year. The pathogen is evolving and that’s where Chickpea Breeding Australia (a partnership between NSW DPI and GRDC) is important to the future of the industry.

“Pathologists make sure that chief breeder Dr Kristy Hobson and her team have the most up-to-date pathogen isolates every year to help keep up with the changing disease.”

Hayley Wilson, who has recently been appointed to the team, will take on this role, maintaining pathology capacity at Tamworth.

With some time now on his hands, Dr Moore plans to learn his local Indigenous language and look into some teaching opportunities. However, he is keen to keep in touch with growers and agronomists, so he might still be seen driving near chickpea paddocks and jumping fences for some time to come.

Dr Moore’s efforts and research have been acknowledged over the years. He was the 2002 GRDC Seed of Light Award winner, a 2005 Pulse Australia Achievement Award winner, a 2010 Brownhill Cup winner and a 2017 Lester Burgess Award winner.