Based on my research trials over the years I am recommending couple of important pre-and post-harvest evaluation steps to reduce post-harvest losses due to this pathogen:
- Please avoid picking melons from low-spots in your field.
- Please pick your healthy looking fields first followed by problematic fields
- Please pay attention to any water-soaked spots on fruit while picking and kindly discard them.
- After picking, carefully grade melons again for any water-soaked spots (can be a tiny as a dime).
- After grading, keep the melons for 48h to 72h under the shed. Based on our observations, we would see symptoms with 48-72h of incubation.
- After 48h to 72 h, please re-grade your melons for Pcap symptoms before shipping. These practices will help in reducing post-harvest losses due to Pcap.