Due to our early spring weather, signs of insect and fungal diseases are showing up on the calendar a little sooner than the previous year.

The calls and visits have started coming in to the office about the various disorders that affect our ornamental and vegetable plants. Questions like what is this sooty mold on my leaves? Or what is causing my tomatoes to fire up?

It usually takes some investigative troubleshooting to find answers to these problems, but no place is more equipped to handle them than your local extension office.

The most effective way to handle insect and fungal diseases is to be proactive. In late winter and early spring, make a plan to begin a thorough check of all your ornamentals.

Plants like azaleas, camellias and roses will begin to be affected by insects such as mites, aphids, lacebugs and scale. They can also be affected by powdery mildew, sooty mold and leaf spot.

For a preventive measure, use products with a 3-in-1 systemic to control insect and fungal diseases. Spray in early spring with a good basic fungicide to ward off many fungal diseases.

Many of these products will control myriad of problems that tend to begin as the weather warms up and humid, moist conditions arise.

Mulch well and give your plants good air circulation with proper pruning to help make the conditions less desirable for problems to arise. Cleaning your pruning tools with bleach or alcohol as you are cutting can also help prevent the spreading of many fungal diseases.

Some problems may exist because of soil conditions and bad drainage problems. These all have to be considered to create a healthy environment for your plants.

For most people, the time to be proactive might have passed and now the plant problems are already upon them. This is when we can help identify problems and get the answers you need to get your plants back on a healthy course. We can suggest both chemical and organic ways to help.

Another need this time of year is keeping your vegetable gardens healthy and growing.

Common vegetable insects include beetles, aphids, worms and whiteflies. Identifying the culprit is the first job at hand and we can give you recommendations on how to control them.

Once again, starting with a soil test and giving your garden the proper nutrients will get you off to a good start.

Regularly check your plants and make sure you are not seeing any insect or fungal activity. Mulch them properly and do not water overhead. This will keep fungal spores from splashing around. Also, a consistent and even watering schedule makes a big difference in the success of your harvest.

Tomatoes in particular can have myriad of issues. Early blight is the term I used earlier about the plant firing up. Blight is more common this year and has been promoted by humid and damp conditions in the last few weeks. It is generally found on older plants.

The most common symptom is dark brown spots with dark concentric rings that develop on the leaves. The disease moves from the bottom up. The leaves die prematurely and the fruit has poor color and might have a sunscald look to it. Again preventive measures can be taken early each year.

Rotate plantings every year, and do not plant the same type of vegetables in the same place each year. Rotating plants in the garden reduces the risk of many tomato disorders. Most fungal diseases live in the soil for more than a year.

A measure of prevention early in the year can get you off to a good start with your ornamentals and vegetables, but when problems arise, give us a call or come by with a sample of your problem. We are always here to help.

Wanda Cannon is a master gardener and also serves as the Hall County Master Gardener coordinator and horticulture assistant for the Hall County Extension office. Phone: 770-535-8293. Her column appears biweekly and on gainesvilletimes.com/life.