Bayer Crop Science's Potential Future

The purple tomato is heading to market.

Platow Brief, a banking and finance publication, says new Bayer AG CEO Bill Anderson and team are working on a deal to spin off the division to improve the pharma giant's financial wellbeing and placate investors.

“This is the earliest we’ve reported tar spot in Iowa,” says Robertson, Iowa State professor of plant pathology. She says the early detection could be due to the Tarspotter app. Here's how it works.

Double-digit yield losses are not uncommon. To date, 14 Illinois counties have confirmed the disease, and it's being scouted for elsewhere by seed company and Extension pathologists and agronomists.